BOSTON (MA)
TheBostonChannel.com
BOSTON -- The Boston Archdiocese contends it can't afford to pay as much on average for the latest round of clergy sexual abuse claims as it did two years ago when it took more than $85 million to settle about 550 claims.
The archdiocese has offered to settle 100 claims for between $5,000 to $200,000 per claim, depending on the severity of the abuse, for a total of $7.5 million, or an average of $75,000 per claimant, according to lawyers for both the plaintiffs and the archdiocese.
That's compared to an an average of $153,000 per claimant it paid in the massive $85 million settlement to 554 people in 2003.
"The dollar amounts, while not as high as in the global settlement, reflect the present financial capability of the Archdiocese and recognize its deteriorated financial condition since the time of the last settlement," church officials said in a statement released Friday.
SPOKANE (WA)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SPOKANE, Wash. -- The Roman Catholic Diocese of Spokane has proposed a new plan that would increase payouts to alleged victims of priest sex abuse and resolve its thorny bankruptcy case.
The plan reveals that the diocese may have $57.5 million available without selling any church property. That's double its initial estimate, The (Spokane) Spokesman-Review reported for a story in Saturday editions.
Diocese attorney Greg Arpin called the new estimate a "best case scenario" that anticipates successful litigation against insurers. He said that would boost the payout to victims from about $15 million to $45 million.
The plan, proposed on Friday, also includes what the diocese hopes will be a simple and successful claim against a Catholic society called the Sulpicians, which trains clergy.
POCATELLO (ID)
Idaho State Journal
By Dan Boyd - Journal Writer
POCATELLO - There are a stack of bills dealing with sexual offenders piling up on the desk of Debbie Field, the chairwoman of the House Judiciary, Rules and Administration Committee.
Some deal with removing the statute of limitations on sex abuse cases and one reportedly goes so far as to institute a mandatory death penalty sentence on any sex offender found guilty of molesting and murdering a child.
After a spate of high-profile sex offender cases this summer, legislators are talking tough on strengthening the state's laws.
But a proposal that Rep. Donna Boe, D-Pocatello, is considering co-sponsoring is among the most intriguing, from legal, ethical and religious points of view.
More than a decade ago, the Legislature exempted clergy from an obligation to report knowledge of sexual abuse. Most other professionals are required to divulge such information.
“Doctors, teachers and all these other professions have to report,” Boe said. “But I think there will be some details to be worked out.”
SPOKANE (WA)
KXLY
SPOKANE- Spokane's Catholic Diocese faces another set back, as it tries to keep schools and churches off the auction block.
In August, a federal bankruptcy judge ruled that parish property belonged to the diocese and could be sold to satisfy sex abuse claims. Up until then the church maintained the diocese only owned buildings like the chancery and bishop's residence.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
Voice of the Faithful of Gtr Phila holds vigil to call on Cardinal Rigali to address clergy sexual abuse crisis in greater depth & respond to concerns raised by organization. Archdiocesan Office Center, 222 N 17th St; 215-247-9645. Noon-1 p.m. Fri.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe
By Ralph Ranalli, Globe Staff | December 31, 2005
An attorney for the Catholic Archdiocese of Boston sharply disagreed yesterday with comments by lawyers for alleged victims of clergy sexual abuse, who contended that the church has adopted a hard line toward abuse survivors in ongoing settlement negotiations.
Thomas H. Hannigan Jr., the lawyer who represented the church in the landmark 2003 settlement in which the archdiocese paid $85 million to 554 people who said they had been sexually abused by clergy, said the church is trying to be both fair and compassionate to the second wave of alleged victims.
''We are very much trying to design a process that is just and sensitive to the survivors," Hannigan said yesterday. ''We are not trying to revictimize anyone or demean them."
HURLEY (WI)
Ironwood Daily Globe
Published Friday, December 30, 2005 11:55:14 AM Central Time
By MARGARET LEVRA
Globe Staff Writer
HURLEY -- Parishioners from St. Mary's Catholic Church in Hurley and area residents had a lot to digest this year about a man considered to be almost saint-like by many, but who later was ruled to be a murderer.
People struggled to accept the ruling that the late Rev. Ryan Erickson shot and killed funeral home director Dan O'Connell, 39, and his 22-year-old intern, James Ellison, at the O'Connell Funeral Home in Hudson, Wis., in February, 2002.
An October John Doe hearing determined Erickson committed the murders.
Erickson, 31, committed suicide on Dec. 19, 2004, in the midst of the double-murder investigation that would later determine Erickson shot and killed O'Connell and Ellison.
Erickson was found hanged outside the hallway between the rectory and St. Mary's Church by friends Rick Reams and Tom Burns, both of Hudson. He left two suicide notes.
The murder investigation by Hudson Police had been quiet for some time, until detectives traveled to Hurley in the fall of 2004 and questioned Erickson in a separate investigation of an allegation that Erickson was involved in a possible crime involving a child or children.
BOSTON (MA)
Allston-Brighton Tab
By Sal Giarratani/ Thinking Out Loud
Friday, December 30, 2005
Since early 2002, when the sexual abuse scandal hit the headlines of newspapers, the Archdiocese of Boston has been in the eye of the storm. So much hurt was uncovered about the abuse of priestly power and the awful cover-up by too many bishops that allowed the abuse to flourish and spread in the first place.
The scandal did seemingly force Cardinal Bernard Law to get outta town, but the Vatican actually gave him a promotion in Rome. Back home we were glad to see him go, but couldn’t understand why the Vatican continued to treat him like a prince.
Over nearly four years, I have written countless commentaries on this horrible story that has damaged the faith lives of so many. Victims of sexual abuse have received compensation for their abuse, but all the money in the world can’t fix the faith of people betrayed by clerical abuse.
Then came Archbishop Sean O’Malley and people hoped for the best, but the best has yet to come. He announced something called reconfiguration. He and Bishop Lennon and the rest of the chancery say it had nothing to do with the sex abuse. Closing churches was about saving money. It was all about dollars and cents, but to many Catholics it made no sense.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston.com
By Michael Kunzelman, Associated Press Writer | December 31, 2005
BOSTON --The Boston Archdiocese cannot afford to pay as much on average for the latest round of clergy sexual abuse claims as it did two years ago when it settled more than 550 claims.
The archdiocese has offered to settle 100 claims for between $5,000 to $200,000 per claim, depending on the severity of the abuse, for a total of $7.5 million, or an average of $75,000 per claimant, according to lawyers for both the plaintiffs and the archdiocese.
That's compared to an $85 million settlement for 554 people in 2003, or an average of $153,000 per claimant.
"The dollar amounts, while not as high as in the global settlement, reflect the present financial capability of the Archdiocese and recognize its deteriorated financial condition since the time of the last settlement," church officials said in a statement released Friday.
BOSTON (MA)
Daily News Tribune
By Kimberly Atkins / Boston Herald
Saturday, December 31, 2005
The Archdiocese of Boston yesterday dismissed criticism it was using harsh legal tactics to cut sex abuse settlements, admonished plaintiffs’ attorneys for talking to the press, and said a lack of personnel and financial resources require it to carefully vet more than 200 remaining abuse claims.
A number of plaintiffs attorneys had blasted church officials Thursday for proposing a multitiered settlement structure that would allow only half the current claimants to avoid a potentially painful fact-finding process, and cap all settlements at a lower amount than those negotiated for 554 victims in 2003.
The rest of the plaintiffs would either have an arbitrator hear testimony and other evidence and rule on whether the abuse took place, or be excluded from arbitration, a process the plaintiffs’ attorneys called a form of revictimization.
In a statement, the church admonished plaintiffs’ attorneys for speaking to reporters about "confidential discussions" with church counsel Thomas Hannigan Jr. and leaking "misleading or inaccurate information about those discussions."
"The Archdiocese, in its offer of the arbitration program, does not intend in any way to demean or re-victimize the survivors of sexual abuse as has been asserted," the statement said.
PORTLAND (OR)
BBC News
Property owned by a US Roman Catholic archdiocese can be used as assets in abuse claim cases, a court has ruled.
Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris ruled the Archdiocese of Portland, Oregon, not its parishes owns church assets.
The decision has dealt a major blow to the archdiocese's efforts to protect church property from claims filed by alleged victims of priest sex abuse.
Portland declared itself bankrupt in July 2004, saying it could not meet the cost of abuse claim cases.
PORTLAND (OR)
The Daily News
By Associated Press
Dec 30, 2005 - 10:08:02 pm PST
PORTLAND -- A bankruptcy judge ruled Friday that the Archdiocese of Portland, not its parishes, owns church assets, dealing a major blow to its efforts to protect church property from lawsuits filed by alleged victims of priest sex abuse.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris, in a pair of opinions, ruled that church property and real estate are under the control of the archdiocese, not its individual parishes, as attorneys for the archdiocese had argued.
In a related ruling, Perris approved questions that attorneys for the victims plan to ask Archbishop William Levada on Jan. 6 when he becomes the highest-ranking Vatican official to testify in a deposition.
The archdiocese became the first in the nation to declare bankruptcy when it filed for protection from creditors in July 2004, just before the scheduled start of jury trials for victims seeking more than $155 million in damages.
BOSTON (MA)
The Day
By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN
& ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published on 12/31/2005
Boston — The Boston Archdiocese has offered to settle another round of sexual abuse claims for less per person than it paid in hundreds of cases two years ago.
The offer was for $5,000 to $200,000 per claim, depending on the severity of the abuse, according to lawyers for both the plaintiffs and the archdiocese.
The Boston Globe, quoting unidentified plaintiffs' lawyers, reported Friday that the payout would total about $7.5 million for about 100 plaintiffs. That would amount to an average payout of about $75,000 if everyone were paid. The 2003 settlements, $85 million to 554 people, averaged $153,000.
Carmen Durso, who represents 33 plaintiffs, said that as part of the settlement offer, some of the alleged victims — those considered to have the weaker of the cases — would have to prove to an arbitrator that the abuse took place and some could face cross-examination by church lawyers.
PORTLAND (OR)
The Oregonian
Friday, December 30, 2005
ASHBEL S. GREEN
and STEVE WOODWARD
A bankruptcy judge today ruled that Catholic parishes and schools in Western Oregon are not separate from the Archdiocese of Portland.
The decision by Judge Elizabeth Perris was largely a victory for plaintiffs who are seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in priest sex-abuse claims.
Perris did leave one unanswered question, about whether selling churches and schools would be an undue burden on the religious freedom of Catholics.
The Archdiocese of Portland became the nation's first Roman Catholic diocese to file for Chapter 11 protection after multimillion-dollar sex-abuse lawsuits last year.
The issue before Perris was whether parish property belongs to individual parishes or to the Archdiocese of Portland, which encompasses 124 parishes, three high schools and about 400,000 parishioners.
The ruling could determine whether the parishes' estimated $500 million in real estate, cash and investments is available to pay millions of dollars in child sexual-abuse claims.
ARLINGTON (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
By MARK AGEE
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
Bishop Terry Hornbuckle, an Arlington minister accused of sexually assaulting congregants, was rearrested Thursday at his Grapevine home after authorities said he violated the conditions of his bail for a third time.
He was being held late Thursday without bail in the Tarrant County Jail, according to a jail worker.
County officials would not say how Hornbuckle, founder and head of Agape Christian Fellowship in southeast Arlington, violated the terms of his bail, citing a gag order on all aspects of the case.
Hornbuckle, 43, faces six counts of sexual assault, along with charges of drug possession, retaliation and tampering with a witness. Five women have accused him.
UNITED KINGDOM
Times & Star
Published on 30/12/2005
A NEW sexual abuse claim has been made against a former Workington priest.
Catholic priest Father Gregory Carroll, 66, was jailed in September for four years on 15 counts of indecent assault and five of gross indecency during his time at Ampleforth College in Yorkshire in the 1970s.
However, he was sent to Workington’s Our Lady and St Michael’s RC Church in 1987, after confessing to church authorities about his behaviour.
Workington’s clergy, the Lancaster diocesan authorities and the church’s parish council were not warned about his sexual behaviour.
UNITED KINGDOM
News & Star
Published on 30/12/2005
A FORMER West Cumbrian priest who was jailed for indecently assaulting young boys has become the subject of claims that he assaulted a Workington boy.
Father Gregory Carroll, 66, was jailed in September for four years on 15 counts of indecent assault and five of gross indecency during his time at Ampleforth College in Yorkshire in the Seventies.
Now a former Workington man claims that he too was a victim of Carroll’s.
The Catholic priest was sent to Workington’s Our Lady and St Michael’s RC Church in 1987, after confessing to church authorities about his sexual behaviour.
BOSTON (MA)
PrimeZone
BOSTON, Dec. 29, 2005 (PRIMEZONE) -- The Catholic Medical Association has formed a Task Force in response to concerns expressed by parents, educators, physicians, priests and Bishops about the appropriateness and effectiveness of child abuse programs. This panel of experts specializing in varying fields of medicine will apply medical science to study the programs for children. This review will be grounded in the developmental, emotional, and moral needs of children, and research on the content and effectiveness of sexual abuse education programs. The Task Force goal is to offer recommendations to the Church, families and educators to aid in the protection of the children and adolescents.
The focus of the study is the impact of such programs on the attitudes, behaviors and development of children. It is the intention to consider the impact these programs have on the self concept of children (particularly during the latency period of development), their attitude toward sexual values, their relationship with parents and other trusted authority figures and their personal sense of 'safety'.
The CMA acknowledges that the intention of those producing, providing, utilizing and participating in these programs are undoubtedly good. It is hoped to provide a service to all those good intentioned persons by pointing out strengths and weaknesses of such programs so that children can truly be kept safe and so that parents who choose to send or allow their children to participate in these programs can do so with a greater appreciation of the moral, spiritual and developmental factors involved.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe
By Frank Phillips, Globe Staff | December 30, 2005
The Catholic Archdiocese of Boston has offered $7.5 million to about 100 alleged victims of clergy sexual abuse, lawyers in the cases said yesterday.
A lawyer for some of the alleged victims called the proposal ''egregiously disingenuous," and others said the offer would provide far less money to each of their clients than the historic 2003 agreement that settled 554 cases.
The lawyers said the archdiocese's attorney, Thomas H. Hannigan Jr., briefed them over the last week on the details of the archdiocese's proposal. The plan would require many of the claimants to prove their case in a mediation process in which they would be cross-examined and may be forced to confront priests accused of abuse, the alleged victims' lawyers said.
NEW YORK
Capital News 9
12/29/2005 10:25 AM
By: Julie Chapman
She grabbed national headlines -- a Catholic school teacher who had sex with her teenage students.
Sandra "Beth" Geisel, 42, shocked the community when she was caught in a car by police having sex with a teenage boy. He was 17, and of the age of consent. But that sparked Geisel, an instructor at Christian Brothers Academy, to tell the school about it. She was fired, and parents were told.
That's when other students from the all-boys private school in Colonie came forward, claiming also to have had sex with the teacher. All were age 17 -- except for one.
A 16-year-old admitted to having sex with Geisel three times. Police investigated and said that's when they were told of Geisel being drunk at parties with the students and having sexual contact with a few of them on a number of occasions.
CANADA
Whitehorse Star
By Candice O’Grady
While a new federal government program has promised almost $2 billion toward compensation and healing for former students of Indian residential schools, it’s not clear where the money will come from.
The program looks like a good beginning, according to Joe Linklater, chief of the Vuntut Gwitchin Chief First Nation. However, he warns, promises like this have been made before.
There have been funding announcements in the past, he said, that turned out to be a combination of new money and old money re-titled.
“We’ve heard the announcement that all of this money is going towards residential school compensation and programs and so on,” he said in an interivew.
“But it remains to be seen whether that is all new money or just money re-profiled from other programs,” he said.
The Star was unable to contact anyone from the office of Anne McLellan, the deputy prime minister and member of the Commons’ aboriginal affairs committee, before the federal government fell in a non-confidence last week.
No one from her office will speak to the media about the money trail at this time due to rules involving what can and cannot be said during election times.
PENSACOLA (FL)
WFTV
POSTED: 7:02 am EST December 29, 2005
UPDATED: 7:03 am EST December 29, 2005
PENSACOLA, Fla. -- A former Pensacola minister will spend nearly three years in prison for soliciting sex from who he thought was a teenager over the Internet.
A judge has sentenced 43-year-old Michael Harris to two years and ten months in prison. Harris pleaded no contest last month to third-degree felony charges of attempted lewd or lascivious battery and using a computer to solicit the sexual conduct of a crime.
Harris was pastor at Saint Paul Lutheran Church.
He was arrested April 13th after going to a soccer field to meet with a 14-year-old boy who was actually an undercover officer.
Escambia County sheriff's officials say Harris began communicating with the boy in an online chat room April 4. Authorities say Harris steered the conversation toward the topic of sex.
NEW YORK
The Jewish Week
Staff Report
A woman claiming she was seduced by Rabbi Mordechai Tendler, who according to court papers told her he was the messiah and could help her find a husband by submitting to his “sex therapy,” has filed suit against the controversial Rockland County spiritual leader.
Adina Marmelstein, 43, is the first woman to take legal action against the rabbi since he was expelled as a member of the Rabbinical Council of America, the largest Orthodox rabbinic association, in March for “conduct inappropriate to an Orthodox rabbi.”
The rabbi had been accused of various degrees of sexual harassment by several women, though it is believed that Marmelstein was not one of the complainants in the RCA case.
According to a suit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court last week, Marmelstein said the rabbi, acting as a religious authority and counselor she trusted, had encounters with her in his rabbinic study from 2001 to 2005, and that his actions were “beyond all bounds of civility and decency.”
NEW YORK
Forward
By Rukhl Schaechter
December 30, 2005
A former congregant has filed a lawsuit against Rabbi Mordecai Tendler, the religious leader of an Orthodox congregation in Monsey, N.Y., accusing him of giving her "sex therapy" when she went to him for counseling.
In the lawsuit, which was filed December 20 in Manhattan and reported December 25 in the New York Post, Adina Marmelstein, 43, claims that Tendler, a father of eight, promised her that he would help her find a husband with whom to raise a family if she slept with him. She is also alleging that Tendler threatened to "have her placed in a straitjacket" if she told anyone about the sessions. The sexual liaisons were allegedly conducted in his rabbinical study in the years 2001 to 2005.
"He had a tremendous amount of power over her," said Marmelstein's lawyer, Lenore Kramer.
Tendler, the scion of a prominent rabbinical family, was expelled from the Rabbinical Council of America in March, after a months-long investigation of allegations that he sexually harassed women who came to him for spiritual guidance. When asked by the Forward whether Marmelstein was one of the women interviewed during the RCA investigation, Rabbi Dale Polakoff, president of the organization, declined to comment, citing the advice of counsel.
PENSACOLA (FL)
The Pensacola News
Kristen Rasmussen
@PensacolaNewsJournal.com
A former local minister was sentenced Wednesday to nearly three years in state prison, despite his plea that he is not a pedophile and "still has much to give" to the community.
Michael Anthony Harris, 43, stood expressionless as Circuit Judge Nick Geeker sentenced him to two years and 10? months. Harris pleaded no contest last month to third-degree felony charges of attempted lewd or lascivious battery and using a computer to solicit the sexual conduct of a crime. He was taken into custody immediately after the sentencing.
Tears and embraces
More than a dozen friends and family members -- including Harris' wife of 21 years, Christa Harris, and their teenage son -- watched the proceeding. Some cried and embraced each other afterward, but all declined comment.
VIRGINIA
Potomac News
By ROB SEAL
rseal@potomacnews.com
Thursday, December 29, 2005
A $10 million dollar sexual assault lawsuit filed against several Baptist church organizations was diminished in scope Wednesday by a Circuit Court judge.
The lawsuit stems from July 2004, when teenage camp counselors abused a 10-year-old boy during a weeklong stay at the Northern Virginia Baptist Youth Camp in Gainesville.
The boy's mother filed a $10 million lawsuit against the camp itself, two counselors and the regional Baptist groups that run the camp.
The suit named several Baptist organizations that contribute members to the camp's board of directors: the Northern Virginia Baptist Association, the Northern Virginia Baptist Center, the Baptist's Women's Association of Northern Virginia and the Northern Virginia Sunday School and Baptist Training Union Convention.
VATICAN CITY
IOL
December 29 2005 at 12:20PM
In the first major ruling of Pope Benedict's reign, the Catholic Church has imposed restrictions on homosexuals becoming priests, saying only men who had overcome "transitory" gay tendencies could be ordained.
The ruling came in a long-awaited eight-page Vatican document that has already sparked controversy after widespread leaks in the past few weeks.
Its strict line on the place of gays in the clergy has won praise from conservatives and condemnation from liberals, and set off heated debates in other churches by confronting an issue that has divided Christian congregations.
The document says practising homosexuals should be barred from entering the priesthood along with men with "deep-seated" homosexual tendencies and those who support gay culture.
VIRGINIA
TimesCommunity
By Jana Renn
jrenn@timespapers.com
12/28/2005
The Rev. Robert Brooks, a former priest at St. Ambrose Catholic Church in Annandale during the 1970s, and more recently, the former pastor of St. John the Apostle Catholic Church in Leesburg, will not be going to jail after pleading no contest to one felony count of attempting to possess child pornography.
Loudoun County Circuit Court Judge Herman Whisenant Jr. recently sentenced Brooks, 73, to three years in jail but suspended the sentence in favor of two years probation.
Whisenant is also requiring Brooks to complete a sexual offender treatment program.
During the hearing, three people who have known Brooks for at least 15 years described him as an honest, caring and generous friend.
Brooks was indicted in February on a felony count of possession of child pornography. Brooks came under investigation in September 2003 when the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it found his name registered on a child pornography Web site.
MASSACHUSETTS
The Sun Chronicle
BY GLORIA LaBOUNTY / SUN CHRONICLE STAFF
One of the most notorious cases of clergy sexual abuse came to a close earlier this year when former priest and convicted pedophile James Porter died of cancer in the midst of a court battle to prevent his release from prison.
But the end of his life did not end the anguish for his many victims who were Catholic school children when Porter assaulted them in the 1960s.
`` He's dead but he's still alive in memories,'' said Peter Calderone of Attleboro, who was a student at St. Mary's School in North Attleboro when Porter, a parish priest, molested him and dozens of his classmates.
`` Not one day in my life goes by that I don't think of that guy,'' said Calderone, one of many victims who began telling their stories publicly in the early 1990s after one of them tracked down Porter in Minnesota, where he was living with his wife and four children.
LIVINGSTON (MT)
Bozeman Daily Chronicle
By SCOTT McMILLION, Chronicle Staff Writer
LIVINGSTON - The public and the media don't need to know the details of how the Church of God handled allegations that one of its ministers molested three teenage girls here, lawyers for the church have argued in court papers.
"Much of the factual information requested may not be entirely free of damaging information which the individuals involved would not wish and, in fact, did not expect to be disclosed publicly," lawyers wrote in a motion filed here earlier this month.
The case involves allegations that Terrence Passmore, a former pastor at the Livingston Church of God, sexually molested three girls who belonged to the church. Two of them are sisters and the third is unrelated. Two of them were 14 at the time and one was 12.
The alleged assaults took place in 1998. A civil suit was filed in April, seeking $3.7 million from Passmore, the local church and its regional and national offices.
NEW BEDFORD (MA)
Standard-Times
By AARON NICODEMUS, Standard-Times staff writer
NEW BEDFORD -- Mayor-elect Scott W. Lang has named Irene B. Schall, a city attorney who once served as city treasurer, as city solicitor.
"She's got a lot of experience, she brings a lot of different things to the city," said Mr. Lang, in making the appointment public yesterday. "She's got excellent judgment. I think she'll represent the city very well." ...
Ms. Schall, of New Bedford, was a board member and civil attorney for the Fall River Diocese Sexual Abuse Review Board, and she drafted regulations for the diocese to follow in cases of sexual abuse of minors by members of the clergy. The rules became a national model.
CANADA
Anglican Journal
SOLANGE DE SANTIS
STAFF WRITER
December 27, 2005 - Canada’s 30 Anglican dioceses are under pressure to approve a revised Indian residential schools settlement agreement with the federal government by Jan. 30, 2006, although national church officials are trying to obtain an extension of the deadline.
“We are aware of the difficulties involved in trying to meet the deadline set by the government and we will do all we can to support you as you deal with due process in your own jurisdictions. We sincerely hope that all dioceses will be able to approve the … agreement based on the benefit that will flow to all dioceses and to the General Synod,” read an information letter dated Dec. 21, 2005, from Acting General Secretary Ellie Johnson and other negotiators.
The letter was sent to all diocesan bishops and chancellors (church legal advisers), members of the church’s national governing body, the Council of General Synod (CoGS) and the Anglican Council of Indigenous Peoples, a national committee.
The document reiterated the terms of a plan announced in late November that would compensate all students who were part of a national boarding school system aimed at educating native children. Also announced was an agreement that would release Roman Catholic entities that ran schools from legal liability, but would commit them to funding $54 million in healing programs for aboriginals.
NEW YORK
The Awareness Center
A Law Suit Filed Against Mordechai Tendler, Kehillat New Hempsted, and Rav Aron Jofen Community Synagogue on December 20, 2005.
This case started during the question-and-answer session of a Makor forum on rabbinic abuse, (back in December, 2003) several female health-care professionals in the audience spoke with passion and frustration about a well-known rabbi in their local community whose affairs with women in his office, they said, have gone on for years.
The speakers said they felt stymied as to how to take action against the unnamed rabbi, who is highly respected, and help the women involved, who are too embarrassed to speak out.
Several sources have informed the Forward newspaper that a number of women have told friends and Jewish communal figures that Rabbi Mordechai Tendler, who is married with eight children, had propositioned them while serving in his role as either rabbinic counselor or religious arbiter."Rabbi Tendler denies all of the allegations that are being made in their entirety," the spokesman wrote in a statement sent to the Forward. "No misconduct was committed by him."
NEW YORK
The Jewish Press
Posted 12/14/2005
By Special to The Jewish Press
Reaction to the November 28 decision of the Jerusalem Bet Din of Israel`s Chief Rabbinate declaring the Rabbinical Council of America in defiance of its rulings (“Lo Tsayis L`din”) in the Tendler case has been fast and furious, sources say.
The RCA leadership is reportedly being challenged by some of its members to answer how the group can ignore the rulings of an established bet din. Some are asking whether performance of religious functions such as wedding ceremonies, kashrut supervision and serving as pulpit rabbis can be compatible with membership in a group that has been declared in open defiance of the rulings of the internationally recognized bet din.
They are also asking whether the activities of the RCA-affiliated Beth Din of America, the chief judge of which was named as a defendant in the bet din proceeding, can have any halachic legitimacy.
NEW YORK
The Jewish Press
Posted 12/21/2005
By Special to The Jewish Press
A former high-ranking Rabbinical Council of America official has resigned from the organization in the wake of the Jerusalem Bet Din`s decision characterizing the RCA as being in defiance of its rulings (“lo tsayis dina”).
The Jerusalem Bet Din of Israel`s Chief Rabbinate recently ordered the RCA to rescind its expulsion of Rabbi Mordecai Tendler over allegations of “improper conduct.”
Rabbi Moshe Faskowitz, longtime executive treasurer of the RCA, submitted his resignation “sadly” in an open letter in this week`s Jewish Press (see page 109).
Sources confirm that Rabbi Faskowitz consulted with other prominent and senior rabbis in the preparation of his letter of resignation and that further resignations from the RCA can be expected.
SPRING VALLEY (NY)
United Press International
SPRING VALLEY, N.Y., Dec. 25 (UPI) -- A New York rabbi allegedly seduced a member of his congregation by claiming to be the messiah and offering her sex therapy.
The woman filed suit against Rabbi Mordecai Tendler of Rockland County last week, accusing him of deceiving and violating her, the New York Post reported.
Adina Marmelstein, 43, said Tendler was acting as a counselor and spiritual authority but went "beyond all bounds of civility and decency." Tendler's attorney called the charges "utterly false."
The Trumpet
In 2002, scandal erupted surrounding Roman Catholic priests’ sexual assaults on children—or, as Pope John Paul ii put it, the way church leaders “are perceived to have acted.” The victims and the world in general demanded answers, wondering how a religious organization could allow such a disgusting problem to become so widespread.
The Vatican’s response was dismissive at best—notably, that of then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
With 2005 drawing to a close, Pope Benedict xvi found himself the target of a civil lawsuit. He was personally accused of conspiring with the archdiocese of Galveston-Houston to cover up the abuse of three boys in the mid-1990s. His legal defense? Diplomatic immunity.
Opposing lawyers argued that a May 18, 2001, letter from Cardinal Ratzinger written as prefect of the Congregation for the Doctine of the Faith was evidence that he was involved in a conspiracy: He said grave crimes would be handled by his congregation and were subject to “pontifical secret” (Fox News, December 23).
Ultimately, though, diplomatic immunity won out. No other religious leader on Earth could have used this particular defense. Papal lawyer Jeffrey Lena said “[Judge] Rosenthal’s ruling recognized that ‘the pope is entitled to immunity like any foreign sovereign without any special limitations imposed upon his immunity just because he is a religious leader’" (ibid.).
COLUMBUS (OH)
Toledo Blade
By JIM PROVANCE
BLADE COLUMBUS BUREAU
COLUMBUS - It would be a list of people "credibly accused" of molesting a child.
It would be a list that any church, scout troop, school, or Little League team could access to check out potential volunteers or employees.
It would be a list of people who might never have been charged with a crime, let alone have been convicted of one.
For this general concept, there is no working model. But it is a concept that the Catholic Church has proposed as an alternative to a bill now before the Ohio House Judiciary Committee.
That bill would suspend for one year the statute of limitations on lawsuits alleging child sex abuse. If passed, the change could lead to hundreds of civil lawsuits alleging sexual abuse as long ago as 35 years.
NEW YORK
New York Post
By DAVID HAFETZ
December 25, 2005 -- A prominent rabbi is being accused of unorthodox and disturbing behavior — seducing a troubled woman in his congregation by telling her he was "the Messiah" and giving her "sex therapy" to help her find a husband.
According to a lawsuit filed last week in Manhattan, Rabbi Mordecai Tendler of Rockland County promised the woman, who was seeking advice, that "doors would open" and "men will come" if she had sex with him.
The rabbi, a father of eight, allegedly told the woman that he was her "only hope." The woman says the rabbi held liaisons in his rabbinical study from 2001 to 2005 and threatened her to remain silent about "the sexual therapy."
Adina Marmelstein, 43, who lives in Manhattan, accuses Tendler of deceiving and violating her and going "beyond all bounds of civility and decency" while he acted as a trusted counselor and spiritual authority.
"He had a tremendous amount of power over her," said Marmelstein's lawyer, Lenore Kramer.
Marmelstein says she first met Tendler — the son of a Yeshiva University professor and the grandson of a highly respected religious arbiter, the late Rabbi Moshe Feinstein — through his "work on behalf of women" in 1994.
In his career, Tendler has advocated for the rights of Orthodox women and assisted Jewish wives obtain religious divorces.
But the rabbi became embroiled in a sex scandal that involved other female accusers and in March was expelled from the Rabbinical Council of America.
BOSTON (MA)
The Eagle-Tribune
By Edward Mason
Staff writer
BOSTON — North of Boston religious leaders are concerned about a proposal to make the finances of religious institutions open to the public.Rooted in the Catholic clergy sex-abuse scandal, lawmakers want religious groups to comply with laws that require charities to be audited and to report their finances to the state attorney general. The push follows efforts by the Boston Archdiocese to shutter or sell properties to pay for settlements of legal cases brought over alleged priest molestation.But local religious leaders say their congregations would suffer. They note their houses of worship are less centralized than the Catholic Archdiocese and worry that compliance would cost many small congregations thousands of dollars and strain already-stretched budgets. If approved by lawmakers, religious institutions would file an annual, 13-page financial report with the attorney general.
SALINAS (CA)
Monterey Herald
By GEORGE B. SANCHEZ
Herald Salinas Bureau
The Salinas-area pastor accused of molesting a mentally handicapped teenager was arraigned Friday in Salinas.
Bail for Donald Domelle, 53, was raised to $510,000 at the request of prosecutor Gary Thelander. His bail was previously set at $300,000, but Thelander said after reviewing the case against the pastor that the increase was justified.
The prosecutor said Domelle could face additional charges. Investigators are trying to determine whether he molested another girl, he said.
"At this point, what we know is that there is a second victim, with a second series of sexual assaults," Thelander said. "I'm pretty confident that we will be filing additional charges."
CALIFORNIA
San Francisco Chronicle
Saturday, December 24, 2005
(12-24) 18:52 PST Salinas, Calif. (AP) --
A pastor accused of molesting a mentally handicapped teenager has been charged with multiple felony counts and could face more as another victim surfaced, prosecutors said.
At his arraignment Friday, Monterey County Superior Judge Marla Anderson raised Donald Domelle's bail from $300,000 to $510,000 at the request of prosecutors, who said more charges likely will be filed against Domelle.
"At this point, what we know is that there is a second victim, with a second series of sexual assaults," said prosecutor Gary Thelander. "I'm pretty confident that we will be filing additional charges."
Domelle, 53, a pastor at the Baptist Temple of Salinas, was arrested Wednesday on suspicion of molesting the 16-year-old girl, after his church, home and used car lot were searched.
COVINGTON (KY)
Challenger NKY
By Jeanne Houck
The Sunday Challenger
jhouck@challengernky.com
COVINGTON - The attorney for members of a class-action lawsuit filed against the Diocese of Covington for priest sexual abuse is optimistic that the church's insurance companies will sign on to a settlement in which the Diocese has agreed to surrender $40 million in cash, investments and property.
Attorney Bob Steinberg of Cincinnati said that lawyers in the case will report on their progress Jan. 5 to federal Judge William Bertelsman in U.S. District Court in Covington.
Lawyers for the class of plaintiffs - which includes about 375 people - and the church announced last summer that they'd reached a $120-million settlement and expected the church's insurance companies - Catholic Mutual and Firemen's Fund - to contribute $80 million of it.
When the insurance companies balked at that amount, the Diocese sued them in federal court.
SIOUX CITY (IA)
Des Moines Register
An 80-year-old Catholic priest accused of sexually abusing children has been defrocked by Vatican officials.
George McFadden, a Diocese of Sioux City priest for more than 50 years, was barred by Vatican officials from performing public ministry, presenting himself as a priest and having unsupervised contact with minors. Instead, McFadden was ordered to serve a "life of prayer and penance," according to the Diocese of Sioux City.
IRELAND
Drogheda Independent
Victims of clerical sex abuse are still waiting for a response from the Vatican to the Ferns report - published two months ago today.
It accused Rome of failing to properly alert bishops and priests to the dangers of child abuse by members of their clergy.
It also revealed that, for more than 30 years, the Vatican obliged victims, witnesses and priests who investigated claims to swear an oath of secrecy or face excommunication.
Colm O'Gorman of the One-in-Four charity says the report is too significant to ignore.
"We must remember that it was a state enquiry, albeit an unstatutory one, was the first report ever internationally to make any finding of responsibility on the Vatican's part for clerical sexual abuse", he said.
WOODLAWN (MD)
Catonsville Times
A second person in religious authority at Woodlawn's Redemption Christian Fellowship has been charged with sexual abuse of a minor.
Less than a month after the church's pastor, Gerald Fitroy Griffith, was arrested on several counts of sexual abuse, a deacon of the church was taken into police custody Dec. 14 on similar charges.
Gary Warren Warfield, 44, has been charged with sexual abuse of a minor as well as second-degree assault and a fourth-degree sex offense, police said.
Warren, who police say denied the charges, allegedly committed the offenses when the now-17-year-old male victim was 14 and 15.
IOWA
WHO
December 23, 2005, Des Moines -The location of Davenport priest William Wiebler is no longer a secret. That's according to some people living in Missouri.
The Davenport Diocese says Wiebler walked away from a treatment program in St. Louis and hasn't been seen since.
That is, until now. People living just outside of St. Louis say Wiebler is living in their apartment complex. They're concerned because Wiebler has admitted to molesting five children. They also say they're worried about their children because they say Wiebler has been wearing a Santa hat and handing out candy to kids.
According to the Diocese, Wiebler has admitted to sexually abusing several minors during the 70's and 80's. He's also the subject of multiple lawsuits, but isn't facing criminal charges.
SAN DIEGO (CA)
Merced Search
Posted by Onell R. Soto
on Dec 24,2005
SAN DIEGO - A San Diego federal judge has rejected an effort by the Roman Catholic Church to declare unconstitutional a state law allowing lawsuits alleging long-ago sexual abuse by priests.
The ruling, made public Thursday, came as a result of an Escondido woman's lawsuit against a religious order in Ohio, which will now move forward.
It deals a blow to church efforts to overturn the California law that allowed hundreds of lawsuits up and down the state, including some 150 cases involving the San Diego diocese.
Many of the lawsuits contend that instead of protecting children, bishops and other superiors who were aware of abuse moved offenders around, sometimes to far-flung or low-income parishes.
Church officials say they did the best they could based on what was known about sexual abuse at the time, including putting problem priests through psychological counseling.
HOUSTON (TX)
Texas Lawyer
By Mary Alice Robbins
Texas Lawyer
Friday, December 23, 2005
On Dec. 22, U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal of Houston dismissed claims against Pope Benedict XVI in a suit in which three plaintiffs allege that the pope conspired to cover up a seminarian's sexual abuse of them in the mid-1990s.
Rosenthal based her decision in John Doe 1, et al. v. The Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, et al. on Pope Benedict's head-of-state-immunity, although the suit was filed in 2004 before he was elected pope. Pope Benedict, formerly Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, alleged in amended motions filed in May that he should be dismissed from the suit on several grounds, including immunity.
The U.S. Department of State issued a suggestion of immunity in May, requesting that the pope be dismissed from the suit. "Judicial review of this determination is not appropriate," Rosenthal wrote in the opinion.
"I think it's a shame that our State Department would get involved in an issue that basically involved covering up the sexual abuse of children in this country," says Tahira Kahn Merritt, attorney for two of the plaintiffs.
ROCHESTER (NY)
Catholic Courier
By Rob Cullivan/Catholic Courier
ROCHESTER -- In U.S. District Court Dec. 14, Judge David G. Larimer sentenced Father Michael J. Volino to 15 months in federal prison. The priest had pleaded guilty in May to one felony count of possession of computer child pornography.
Upon completion of his sentence, Father Volino must register as a sex offender, and he will be on supervised release for 10 years, Larimer said.
The judged ordered Father Volino to report to a federal prison within six to eight weeks to begin serving his sentence.
In May, the priest admitted that he possessed child pornography on his computer in October 2004. According to an FBI affidavit, an employee of the Diocese of Rochester had discovered pornography while servicing Father Volino's computer in January 2005, and the diocese alerted authorities.
Father Volino had been parochial vicar at Greece's St. John the Evangelist Parish at the time the charges were filed, and the diocese placed him on administrative leave, prohibiting him from public ministry.
HOUSTON (TX)
Houston Chronicle
By HARVEY RICE
Houston Chronicle
A Houston federal judge has removed Pope Benedict XVI from a lawsuit accusing him of being part of a conspiracy to cover up the molestation of three boys in the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston.
A letter from the U.S. State Department giving the pope sovereign immunity shields him from further legal action, U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal ruled.
"Pope Benedict's motion to dismiss all claims against him is granted on the basis of this court's recognition of head-of-state immunity," she wrote.
The lawsuit — by three men listed in court documents as John Does I, II and III — alleges that they were molested as boys by then-seminary student Juan Carlos Patino Arango in the mid-1990s. Rosenthal's ruling leaves the archdiocese, Archbishop Joseph Fiorenza, Monsignor William Pickard and Patino Arango as defendants.
Tahira Merritt , attorney for the plaintiffs, now 23, 19 and 21, said she has not decided whether to appeal Rosenthal's ruling.
"We're going to press forward with the case and hope we can get Patino to stand trial and go forward with the case against the archdiocese," Merritt said.
DES MOINES (IA)
Sioux City Journal
DES MOINES (AP) -- An inactive Roman Catholic priest from the Davenport Dioecese, who allegedly sexually abused children has been located in University City, Mo.
The Davenport Diocese on Tuesday said it had lost contact with the Rev. William Wiebler, who is facing several sexual abuse lawsuits. He had left a treatment program in St. Louis and had not made contact with church officials.
Diocese officials said they were concerned that he was running around loose in St. Louis, said Rand Wonio, the diocese's attorney.
Wiebler left the Quad-Cities in 1985 and has been accused of abuse dating to the 1970s and 1980s. He moved to St. Louis more than a year ago and was ordered by the diocese to stay in a treatment program and avoid contact with minors, Wonio said.
The diocese recently sent Deacon David Montgomery to St. Louis, but Wiebler has not been found at his residence or the bakery where he worked.
SAN DIEGO (CA)
Reno Gazette-Journal
STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
Posted: 12/24/2005
A federal judge in San Diego has rejected the Roman Catholic Church's effort to strike down a state law that allows lawsuits by people who claim they were abused by priests long ago.
More than 153 are pending against the San Diego diocese and 560 abuse claims are pending against the Los Angeles Archdiocese. The San Diego diocese had argued the 2002 law illegally interfered with its religious practices.
Former Reno Bishop Phillip Straling is considered a key witness in most of the San Diego cases. John Manly, a Costa Mesa, Calif.-based attorney handling many of the lawsuits, said Friday that he plans to call Straling to testify on two cases soon.
Straling is not accused of molesting children.
ALASKA
Fairbanks News-Miner
By CHRIS TALBOTT, Staff Writer
A Nome Superior Court judge has dismissed a civil suit against the Rev. James Poole, but left on course a trial against the Fairbanks Diocese and the Society of Jesuits.
The attorney for Jane Doe 2 called the ruling a victory, despite the fact his client's accused abuser won't stand trial.
"This has incredible ramifications for the other cases because this is the first decision about whether these things can go forward," Ken Roosa said. "These cases are still viable. These cases are not stillborn."
Judge Ben Esch ruled that the charges against Poole long exceeded the state's statute of limitations and dismissed him from Jane Doe's 2 civil suit. Poole still faces suits by Jane Does 3 and 4.
WATERLOO (IA)
Courier
By JEFF REINITZ, Courier Staff Writer
WATERLOO --- A retired minister man has been arrested for making sexual advances to an elderly woman at a care facility.
Waterloo police arrested the Rev. Galen Ermil Peckham, 71, of 15 Bluff St., La Porte City, Tuesday morning for indecent exposure, assault with intent to commit sexual abuse and two counts of simple assault.
He was booked at the Black Hawk County Jail and let out an hour or so later on pretrial release.
According to police and court records, Peckham is a visiting minister and was paying a visit to a 93-year-old woman at Manor Care in November when the incident happened.
Peckham kissed the woman on the mouth, touched her breast and exposed his genitals, records state.
HAWAII
Honolulu Star-Bulletin
A woman who says she was sexually molested by a Honolulu Catholic priest in 1964 filed a suit Monday asking for an apology and monetary damages.
Lavonne Cobb accused the Rev. Henry Sabog of sexual misconduct in the suit, which also names the Honolulu Catholic diocese and Pope Benedict XVI as defendants.
Cobb said the alleged incident happened when she was 12 years old and attending a catechism class taught by Sabog at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church rectory in Pearl City.
According to the suit, Cobb "suffered from repressed or lost memory." She "did not realize that she had been injured ... until 2004, when she read about sexual abuse."
VATICAN CITY
Daily News
December 23, 2005
Vatican City: A US judge in Texas has ruled that Pope Benedict XVI enjoys immunity as a head of state and removed him from a civil lawsuit accusing him of conspiracy to cover up the sexual abuse of minors by a seminarian.
According to a copy of yesterday's ruling, US District Judge Lee Rosenthal cited a motion filed by the US Justice Department in which the government said that allowing the suit to proceed would be "incompatible with the United States' foreign policy interests".
"After a suggestion of immunity is filed, it is the court's duty to surrender jurisdiction," Rosenthal wrote in the ruling from US District Court in Houston.
Joseph Ratzinger - Bene-dict's former name - is named as a defendant in the civil lawsuit, accused of conspiring with the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston and some of its officials to cover up the abuse of three boys during the mid-1990s. The suit is seeking monetary damages.
The three boys, identified in court documents as John Does I, II and III, allege that a Colombian-born seminarian at St Francis de Sales church in Houston, Juan Carlos Patino-Arango, molested them during counselling sessions in the church in the mid-1990s.
NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph
By Deborah McAleese
newsdesk@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
23 December 2005
THE PSNI has met with senior officials from the Catholic Church to discuss allegations of clerical child sex abuse.
No decision on the type of action to be taken to address the problem will be made until the outcome of the meetings, which are due to wrap up this week.
In the wake of the damning Ferns report into clerical sex abuse in Co Wexford - which found that over 140 priests in four dioceses have been accused of sexual abuse - the Government has been asked if it plans to launch a probe into clerical child sex abuse in all maintained schools in Northern Ireland.
It has also been asked if a joint inquiry with authorities in the Republic into clerical child sex abuse within Catholic Church diocese that straddle the border will be carried out.
Direct Rule Minister Shaun Woodward has confirmed that a series of meetings have been held between the Catholic Church, the PSNI, the Department of Health and health bodies in the Republic.
He said that decisions on the actions to be taken will be made following another meeting due to take place before Christmas.
NORTHERN IRELAND
News Letter
By Philip Bradfield
Friday 23rd December 2005
The PSNI and social services are considering a Northern Ireland public inquiry in the wake of the Ferns Report into clerical child abuse in the Republic.
Two months ago, an Irish government inquiry into abuse in the Co Wexford diocese of Ferns uncovered over 100 allegations of sexual abuse by 21 priests between 1966-2002 and strongly criticised the failings of bishops and gardai.
The fact that Northern Ireland authorities are now considering a similar inquiry was revealed following a recent Parliamentary Question by Upper Bann DUP MP David Simpson.
He asked how many allegations of Roman Catholic clerical child abuse the PSNI and Department of Education had on record, but was told police had no central records and the department did not collect the information.
The Tidings
When the issue of clergy sexual abuse in the Catholic Church broke open in the media in 2002, the focus was rightly placed upon the suffering of victims, the duplicity of the abusers, and the mistakes that church leaders made in past decades in understanding and effectively dealing with the problem of abusive priests.
In the three years since the crisis gained national attention, however, very little media attention has been focused on the tremendous strides the church has made in creating safe environments for children. And more troubling, the persistent focus of media attention on the scandal itself has helped create an impression in the public's mind that the Catholic Church has done almost nothing to deal with the problem, and that sexual abuse is a problem largely limited to the Catholic Church itself.
PHOENIX (AZ)
KVOA
PHOENIX One-time fugitive priest Joseph Briceno has waived extradition.
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office says Briceno can be brought back to Phoenix at anytime.
Briceno is currently jailed in El Centro, California, after he was captured near Calexico.
Briceno had been hiding out in Mexico.
Briceno is wanted on eight counts of sex crimes involving two minors.
ALASKA
KTUU
Thursday, December 22, 2005 - by Jason Moore
Anchorage, Alaska - A Nome judge dismissed civil allegations of child sexual abuse against a former Alaska priest. Rev. Jim Poole is accused of molesting children in the mid-1970s while working in Nome. The judge ruled the statute of limitations has expired for Poole. But the judge says the case against the Diocese of Fairbanks and the Society of Jesus can go forward.
For attorney Ken Roosa, who represents three of Poole's alleged victims, it’s a disappointment Poole is now excused from the lawsuit. But Roosa is pleased the lawsuit will go forward against the Catholic Diocese of Fairbanks and the Jesuit organization, Society of Jesus, which employed Poole.
The ruling from Nome Judge Ben Esch says the statute of limitations has expired for Poole, with the allegations coming forward close to 30 years after the alleged abuse. The church organizations were hoping they too would be excused on that basis.
CALIFORNIA
The Press-Enterprise
By MICHAEL FISHER / The Press-Enterprise
A federal judge on Thursday rejected a request by the Diocese of San Diego to overturn a 2003 state law that permitted hundreds of clergy-abuse lawsuits to be filed statewide.
In his ruling, U.S. District Court Judge William Hayes in San Diego found the law is constitutional and does not infringe on the religious practices of the Roman Catholic Church.
The law, enacted by the Legislature, had temporarily lifted the statute of limitations for child-sexual-abuse lawsuits while specifically allowing institutions to be sued if they protect abusive employees.
The Diocese of San Bernardino backed the challenge to the law.
Officials with the Inland diocese could not be reached for comment Thursday.
CALIFORNIA
Los Angeles Times
By Jean Guccione, Times Staff Writer
A federal judge Thursday upheld the constitutionality of a California law that opened courthouse doors to more than 1,000 people who sued the Roman Catholic Church for allegedly failing to protect them from predator priests.
U.S. District Court Judge William Q. Hayes in San Diego became the second judge in California to reject arguments that the law illegally interferes with the Catholic Church's religious practices.
"The failure to supervise or negligent hiring of a person that commits sexual assault does not implicate or effect any religious belief, opinion or practice," Hayes wrote.
The ruling arises from a negligence suit brought by a woman who alleged that she was repeatedly raped and sexually abused by a priest at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Escondido beginning when she was 12. Her alleged abuser, Father Victor Uboldi, is dead.
She is suing the Sisters of the Precious Blood, the religious order of nuns who once ran the school.
NEW JERSEY
The Jersey Journal
Friday, December 23, 2005
By JASON DEL REY
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER
A priest who counsels victims of clergy sex abuse and who recently filed a lawsuit against the Archdiocese of Newark claiming wrongful termination has been placed on administrative leave until litigation is resolved, said a spokesman for the Archdiocese.
"Because of the public nature of the lawsuit, it was decided to place Father on leave until the matter is resolved," said the spokesman, James Goodness.
The Rev. Robert Hoatson, 54, will receive pay and benefits during his leave from ministry but cannot administer the sacraments, Goodness confirmed.
In letters published in The Jersey Journal this fall, Hoatson criticized the Archdiocese's handling of allegations of sexual abuse against Monsignor Peter Cheplic, who worked in several Hudson County parishes. Hoatson has also counseled Joseph Capozzi, of Manhattan, one of Cheplic's alleged victims.
"It would do James Goodness and the Archdiocese of Newark well to focus on the truth rather than the impression people have of them," he wrote in one of the letters.
UNIVERSITY CITY (MO)
Des Moines Register
By SHIRLEY RAGSDALE
REGISTER RELIGION EDITOR
December 23, 2005
When a "nice old gentleman" moved into Sandra Ford's apartment building in University City, Mo., she didn't think anything of it.
The 37-year-old mother and full-time student made a mental note to add him to the number of oldsters for whom she occasionally cooks.
"He was outgoing and friendly," Ford said. "He brought cookies and bread to my 6-year-old son from the bakery he worked for."
Several weeks later, she heard that the man was the Rev. William Wiebler, an inactive priest from the Davenport Catholic Diocese in Iowa who has been accused of sexually abusing children.
"I freaked," Ford said Thursday.
The Davenport Diocese on Tuesday reported it had lost contact with Wiebler after Deacon David Montgomery went to St. Louis to check up on the priest, who has been recommended to the Vatican for defrocking.
UNIVERSITY PARK (MO)
Quad-City Times
By Robert Patrick
UNIVERSITY CITY, Mo. — Advocates for victims of clergy sex abuse passed out leaflets Thursday in a neighborhood of this St. Louis suburb, warning people about a former Quad-City area priest with a white beard and hair who they say has worn a Santa Claus cap while passing out candy to children.
The Davenport Catholic Diocese has said the Rev. William Wiebler admitted molesting several minors during the 1970s and ‘80s. Neighbors have been concerned ever since he left the St. John Vianney Renewal Center in Jefferson County, Mo., during the spring of 2004 and moved to University City.
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, passed out bright yellow flyers including a color photograph of Wiebler in a bushy white beard and Hawaiian-type shirt.
Wiebler did not respond to his front intercom buzzer or knocks on his back door Thursday, although he was in the house and looked through the blinds at a Post-Dispatch reporter. He bore a striking resemblance to popular depictions of Santa Claus with his hair and bushy beard set off by what appeared to be either a red shirt or red long johns.
ALASKA
Anchorage Daily News
By LISA DEMER
Anchorage Daily News
Published: December 23, 2005
Last Modified: December 23, 2005 at 01:18 AM
A former Kenai priest, now dead, abused a teenage girl in Kenai starting when she was 8 or 9 and continuing for eight years, a new lawsuit contends.
The late Rev. Robert Wells served as a priest in Our Lady of the Angels parish in Kenai from 1974 to 1988, when he moved to Sacred Heart Parish in Seward. He had a heart attack in 1990, had a heart transplant that year, and died in 1992, according to his obituary.
The new suit, filed last week in Anchorage Superior Court by Kenai attorney James Butler and Seattle attorney Michael Phau, names as defendants the Archdiocese of Anchorage and Our Lady of the Angels parish in Kenai.
It contends the archdiocese and the parish knew or should have known that Wells was a "dangerous child molester" who shouldn't work around children. Yet he still was assigned to serve as parish priest.
SAN DIEGO (CA)
Contra Costa Times
Associated Press
SAN DIEGO - A federal judge has rejected the Roman Catholic Church's effort to strike down a state law that allows lawsuits by people who claim they were abused by priests long ago.
The San Diego diocese had argued that the 2002 law illegally interfered with its religious practices.
"The failure to supervise or negligent hiring of a person that commits sexual assault does not implicate or affect any religious belief, opinion or practice," U.S. District Court Judge William Q. Hayes wrote in a ruling made public Thursday.
Attorney J. Michael Hennigan, who represents the San Diego diocese Los Angeles Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, said the church is "strongly considering an appeal."
DENVER (CO)
Denver Post
The Archdiocese of Denver was sued Wednesday in two separate lawsuits brought by men who claimed that as altar boys they were molested by Catholic priests. One suit named former priest Harold Robert White as the perpetrator, and the other named the Rev. Leonard Abercrombie. Abercrombie died in 1994.
The suit naming White says that the plaintiff, "John Doe No. 5," was born in 1952 and that during the boy's high school years, White was his pastor at St. Anthony's Catholic Church in Sterling. The lawsuit alleges the Sterling man was molested in the rectory of St. Anthony's as well as in White's car.
The other lawsuit says that Abercrombie's accuser was born in 1949 and that Abercrombie was the family's pastor at Sacred Heart Parish in Roggen. The alleged sexual assaults by Abercrombie took place on church grounds, in a small community church in Hudson and on a skiing trip, the suit alleges.
HAWAII
KGMB 9
Cedric Moon - cmoon@kgmb9.com
Honolulu's Catholic Diocese is facing another legal battle - this time from a woman who says she was sexually abused by her priest more than 40 years ago.
Lavonne Cobb is now in her 50s. She says she was attacked by her priest, Henry Sabog, when she was 12 years old at Our Lady of Good Counsel Catholic Church in 1964.
In her complaint, Cobb says Sabog reached under her dress and grabbed her thighs. Then he moved his hands up and put them in her panties before she was able to run away.
Lavonne Cobb says she forgot all about the attack, but recent headlines about church sex abuse cases brought it all back more than 40 years later.
ALASKA
Anchorage Daily News
The Associated Press
Published: December 21, 2005
Last Modified: December 21, 2005 at 02:38 PM
KENAI -- A woman is suing the Archdiocese of Anchorage, claiming she was sexually abused by a priest in Kenai between 1974 and 1988.
The plaintiff, identified as Jane Doe, contends the church failed to honor her request for anonymity for herself and the priest, the Rev. Robert Wells, who died in 1992.
In exchange for her agreement not to bring legal action against the archdiocese, the church agreed to her strict anonymity request and to pay for counseling, according to the complaint filed Friday in Anchorage Superior Court.
In a letter from Archbishop Roger Schwietz, read at Kenai Peninsula church services in March 2004, however, Wells was identified as the priest, assigned to Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Church in Kenai, who allegedly sexually abused a female minor.
HOUSTON (TX)
San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, December 22, 2005
(12-22) 14:16 PST VATICAN CITY, (AP) --
A U.S. judge in Texas dismissed Pope Benedict XVI from a civil lawsuit accusing him of conspiracy to cover up the sexual abuse of minors by a seminarian, ruling Thursday that the pontiff has immunity as a head of state.
U.S. District Judge Lee Rosenthal cited a motion filed by the Justice Department, known as a "Suggestion of Immunity," in which the government said allowing the lawsuit to proceed would be "incompatible with the United States' foreign policy interests."
"After a suggestion of immunity is filed, it is the court's duty to surrender jurisdiction," Rosenthal wrote in the ruling, a copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press.
Joseph Ratzinger — Benedict's former name — is named as a defendant in the civil lawsuit, accused of conspiring with the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston and some of its officials to cover up the abuse of three boys during the mid-1990s. The lawsuit seeks unspecified monetary damages.
LEESBURG (VA)
Leesburg Day
Dan Telvock
Dec 22, 2005 -- In a letter sent to a Loudoun Circuit Court judge, a Chantilly pastor sharply criticized Commonwealth’s Attorney Jim Plowman for his prosecution of Father Robert Brooks, a former Leesburg priest who pleaded no contest to attempting to possess child pornography, saying the prosecutor’s handling of the case was “not Christian.”
The Rev. Sean K. Rousseau of the Corpus Christi Catholic Mission in Chantilly, and a former pastor at St. John’s the Apostle Catholic Church in Leesburg where Brooks worked, wrote Circuit Court Judge Thomas D. Horne on Nov. 20 and stated he is appalled with the actions of Plowman in the Brooks case, saying Plowman is “a man who calls himself a Catholic, yet he purposefully persecutes a priest in the public forum for a private weakness.”
Rousseau’s letter was recently included in the court file for Brooks, 73, who was ordered to serve two years on probation after his sentencing Dec. 12. Horne was not the judge in the case because he recused himself, along with the other two Circuit Court judges.
NEWARK (NJ)
Newsday
December 22, 2005, 9:51 AM EST
NEWARK, N.J. (AP) _ A priest who is suing the Archdiocese of Newark for removing him from his position at an Orange school for criticizing the way the church has handled the sex-abuse scandal has been placed on administrative leave, and cannot represent himself as a priest until the matter is resolved.
The Rev. Robert Hoatson, 54, will continue to receive his salary and medical benefits.
In a lawsuit filed last week, Hoatson claims he was wrongly removed from his position as a church schools director at Our Lady of Good Counsel in Orange in 2003 because he publicly criticized American bishops for covering up aspects of the clergy sex scandal.
But church officials say they removed him from the schools job because of concerns about his management and other issues.
"It's sad because what I do best is preach and say Mass," Hoatson told The Record of Bergen County for Thursday's newspapers. "But I'll be back."
Jim Goodness, a spokesman for the archdiocese, told The Star-Ledger of Newark the priest was placed on leave Tuesday because the lawsuit "is in the public eye right now, and it's best left to let the litigation proceed on its own without him acting in priestly ministry."
NEW ZEALAND
New Zealand Herald
23.12.05
A retired Catholic brother jailed yesterday for sexually abusing schoolboys in his care in the late 1970s was himself abused as a youngster, the Wellington District Court was told.
John Louis Stevenson, 66, was jailed for 3 1/2 years for sexually assaulting four boys aged between 14 and 16 at the Hato Paora Maori Boys school in Feilding from 1976 to 1981.
Stevenson had pleaded guilty to six charges of indecent assault and one of inducing an indecent act.
Known as Brother Bernard while employed at the school as a sports coach and tuck shop manager from 1970 to 1983, Stevenson has entered no plea to further sex charges and will return to court on January 30.
His lawyer, Mike Antunovic, said Stevenson was abused at two stages of his life at a time when he was vulnerable.
NEW ZEALAND
Radio New Zealand
Posted at 11:16am on 22 Dec 2005
A former Catholic teacher was today sentenced to three and a half years prison for sexual abusing four boys at a Manawatu boarding school.
John Louis Stevenson, who was known at the time of the offending as Brother Bernard; pleaded guilty to six charges of indecent assault and one of inducing a 14 year old boy to commit an indecent act between 1976 - 1981.
66 year old Stevenson was a teacher at the Hato Paora Maori Boys Catholic School in Fielding near Palmerston North.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia City Paper
by J.F. Pirro
Twenty years ago, Brian Henderson wore his full habit more, well, habitually as a clear sign he was a cleric. Now, the Southwest Philly native, who last spring celebrated his 25th year as a member of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, says the crisis in the Catholic Church has left many priests and Brothers embarrassed to wear their collars.
While Henderson usually wears a collared shirt, sweater and khakis, his preference for casual clothing isn't a betrayal of his religious life. The Brothers' unique habit—a judgelike black robe with a wide, white collar—just isn't part of the persona he wants to portray. Instead, Henderson, 46, wants to play the simple servant. What he definitely doesn't want for himself, or any member of his 325-year-old religious order, is to be lumped in with the priests.
"Like that Billy Joel song goes, 'We didn't start the fire,' but if the church is a hay barn, the barn's fully engulfed," says Henderson, a West Catholic product who entered the fold during his third year at La Salle University. "I can't fix the controversy, and I can't say [the Brothers] are all clean of heart and hand … but part of being a Brother is helping everyone be a better brother and sister to everyone else."
MICHIGAN
Battle Creek Enquirer
The Rev. Joy E. Rogers
St. Thomas Episcopal Church
"Safeguarding God's Children." That's what my denomination calls a comprehensive program of workshops and conscious raising and policies that intend to make our churches safe places for all of our children and youth.
All clergy and staff, lay leaders and anyone who works with our young ones — Sunday school teachers, youth leaders, camp counselors — are required to participate. It is a necessity born of painful truths that have emerged over decades — truths about the violence of our culture and the vulnerability of our children to those who would abuse and exploit them.
The grim statistics call us all into question — children are more at risk from family members, family friends and neighbors and even their church family than from total strangers.
One morning a month, a group of local clergy gather at the Enquirer for a conversation on questions of faith and its role in our lives and society. It is always a respectful exchange but often bewildering. It is hard to comprehend how people who are united in a passion for the Gospel and their love of the Lord move to such differing interpretations of those passions in the implications of them for their lives.
But the week we discussed violence, especially sexual violence, against children, a group of contrary clergy united. We all struggle to make our churches safe for children and to be a healing place for those who have been wounded.
MICHIGAN
Kalamazoo Gazette
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
dperson@kalamazoogazette.com 388-8555
Retired Kalamazoo County Probate Judge James S. Casey, whose innovative programs on behalf of children, the elderly and the mentally ill had statewide significance, died of pneumonia Tuesday at University of Chicago Hospital, where he was undergoing treatment for leukemia. He was 72.
Casey, who served as a probate judge for 20 years -- from 1976 to 1996 -- was a compassionate person, both on and off the bench, said local attorney Harry Contos Jr., who graduated from law school with Casey at the University of Notre Dame in 1961. ...
In 2002, the Catholic Diocese of Kalamazoo appointed Casey to chair the Diocesan Review Board, which was established to investigate charges of clergy sexual abuse.
NEWARK (NJ)
The Star-Ledger
Thursday, December 22, 2005
BY JEFF DIAMANT
Star-Ledger Staff
The Newark archdiocese placed a Catholic priest on administrative leave a week after he sued the archdiocese, Archbishop John J. Myers and Catholic entities in New York for $5 million.
The Rev. Robert Hoatson, 54, who has served as counselor for Catholic Charities since 2004, will not be permitted to present himself as a priest until the lawsuit is resolved, said James Goodness, an archdiocese spokesman. He will receive his salary and medical benefits.
Hoatson's lawsuit, filed Dec. 13, contends he was improperly removed from his position as a church schools director at Our Lady of Good Counsel in Orange in 2003 because he publicly criticized American bishops for cover-ups related to the clergy sex scandal.
Archdiocese officials say they removed him from the schools job because of concerns about his management, his relationship with the school finance committee, and because he had, at one point, asked to be removed.
Hoatson has counseled dozens of victims of clergy sex abuse, even heading a local chapter of the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests. He has been quoted frequently in newspapers, including this one, about the abuse scandal.
SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
The Bay Area Reporter
Cautious optimism by gay Catholics and others greeted last Thursday's papal announcement it would install Salt Lake City Bishop George Niederauer as San Francisco's next archbishop.
The archdiocese serves 425,000 parishioners in San Francisco, Marin, and San Mateo counties. Niederauer will continue directing the Utah diocese until his installation February 15. ...
Niederauer told the Los Angeles Times last year that he regretted his 1986 letter urging a judge to give lenience to a former Orange County priest and friend, ultimately convicted of 26 counts of felony child sex abuse and, after violating probation, sentenced to six years in prison. Last week he called the letter a mistake.
"That impressed me," said pastor Craig Forner of St. Kevin's Church in Bernal Heights. Forner, who called Niederauer broad-minded, praised his "grasp of reality," and anticipates Niederauer's interaction with LGBTs. "Very few bishops are that open. I hope we would give him credit for what he learned. A man willing to admit he made a mistake."
PENNSYLVANIA
Philadelphia Daily News
By THERESA CONROY
conroyt@phillynews.com
AS MARTIN DONOHOE sat beneath a blanket on an antique sofa in his Medford, N.J., home, he quickly moved from one issue to the next, ruminating over details.
He could spend an hour deconstructing a single moment in time. He could live inside the nuance of one gesture or one statement.
Donohoe's obsession is understandable - even expected.
For two years, when he was between the ages of 15 and 17, he was repeatedly molested, manipulated, dominated and defiled by a Roman Catholic priest. His attacker, the Rev. James Behan, was a trusted teacher at North Catholic High School when Donohoe attended in the late 1970s.
For more than two decades, Donohoe yearned for the day when the priest would get his just punishment. The victim, now 42, edged closer to that dream when he first reported the allegations to the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office in April 2002.
BRIDGEWATER (MA)
Enterprise
By Maureen Boyle, ENTERPRISE STAFF WRITER
A former maintenance man at St. Thomas Aquinas parish in Bridgewater was convicted Tuesday of sex-related crimes and ordered to spend a year in jail.
Reed F. Haviland, 53, was convicted in Brockton Superior Court of one count of an unnatural act.
Judge Patrick Brady sentenced Haviland to 2-1/2 years in the House of Correction with one year to serve. Haviland was also ordered to stay way from the victim.
Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz said the guilty verdict followed a four-day trial.
The conviction stemmed from allegations that the defendant was inserting needles or large knitting needles into his body in the presence of a 14-year-old boy, Cruz said.
The incidents occurred in the parish center back room.
At the time of the arrest, Haviland was the first person in Plymouth County affiliated with the church to be charged with a sex crime since the archdiocese became embroiled in its priest abuse scandal.
WINCHESTER (MA)
Stoneham Sun
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
On Monday, Jan. 9, at 7:30 p.m., the Winchester Area Voice of the Faithful welcomes Dr. Martin Kafka as a guest speaker to its regular weekly meeting at St. Eulalia's Church, 50 Ridge St. in Winchester. Admission is free, and all are welcome to attend.
Kafka is an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, and a clinical associate in psychiatry in McLean Hospital. He has served as president of the Massachusetts chapter of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers.
In 2003, Kafka was invited to the Vatican where he participated in a conference on the theme of abuse of children and young people by Catholic priests and religious. His talk is called "Psychiatric Consultation at the Vatican: The Sexual Abuse Crisis."
ALASKA
Kenai Peninsula Online
By PHIL HERMANEK
Peninsula Clarion
Claiming the Catholic Archdiocese of Anchorage violated an agreement of anonymity, a woman filed a lawsuit Friday alleging she was sexually abused by a priest in Kenai between 1974 and 1988.
Identified in the suit only as Jane Doe, the victim says she requested anonymity in her identity and the identity of the alleged perpetrator, who died in 1992.
In exchange for her agreement not to bring legal action against the archdiocese, the church agreed to her strict anonymity request and to pay for counseling, the complaint states.
In a letter from Archbishop Roger Schwietz, read at Kenai Peninsula church services in March 2004, however, the Rev. Robert Wells was identified as the priest, assigned to Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Church in Kenai, who allegedly sexually abused a female minor.
UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News
A County Fermanagh priest charged with indecent assault and facilitating the rape of a 12-year-old girl has been released on bail.
Father Jeremiah McGrath, 62, of the Parochial House in Rosslea, appeared at Liverpool Crown Court.
The alleged offences occurred between May and November 2005 in England.
Fr McGrath, who denies the charges, was ordered to stay at an address in Sussex, surrender his passport and was banned from entering Merseyside.
UNITED KINGDOM
U.TV
A Catholic priest appeared in court via videolink today charged with indecent assault and facilitation of the rape of a 12-year-old girl.
Father Jeremiah McGrath, 62, appeared at Liverpool Crown Court following his arrest in Northern Ireland last Wednesday.
MAINE
Bangor Daily News
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland has suspended from ministry a former Maine priest who was arrested last week in Marble Falls, Texas, and charged with groping a teenage boy in a movie theater.
The Rev. Paul Clogan, 74, a priest at St. Paul the Apostle Catholic Church in Horseshoe Falls, Texas, was ordained in 1999 after spending 35 years teaching English in Texas.
Both Texas communities are about 50 miles northwest of Austin.
Clogan was born in 1931 in Boston and became a priest after he was widowed. He was an English professor for 35 years before becoming a priest.
OHIO
Toledo Blade
OHIO'S Roman Catholic bishops made a strategic mistake last week when they sent one of their relative newcomers to appear before the Ohio House Judiciary Committee on legislation that would open a new avenue for civil lawsuits alleging long-ago sexual abuse by clergy.
Lawmakers had been hoping for some answers and explanation on public policy changes to deal with the realization that the church hierarchy covered up such abuse for decades. What they got, instead, was yet another variation on official stonewalling.
It came in the form of testimony from Bishop Frederick Campbell, of the Columbus diocese, who has been in office just 11 months and has had little experience with abuse cases.
Damning with faint praise, the committee's chairman, Rep. John Willamowski, of Lima, described Bishop Campbell as "one of the most decent and honorable people who could come before us, but also one of the least knowledgeable."
Indeed, when another lawmaker asked pointed questions about what he said was the church's long-standing policy of "moving priests [accused of abuse] and flat-out lying to people," Bishop Campbell said he was "appalled" by such behavior but could not comment on the reaction of any of his fellow bishops.
ARLINGTON (TX)
The Dallas Morning News
05:27 PM CST on Tuesday, December 20, 2005
By JEFF MOSIER / The Dallas Morning News
Terry Hornbuckle, an Arlington pastor facing nine felony charges including sexual assault, was released from jail Monday on $1.5 million bail.
Mr. Hornbuckle, founder of Agape Christian Fellowship Church, has been in the Tarrant County jail since August without bail after failing to provide a urine test.
Mr. Hornbuckle is facing six counts of sexual assault and charges of possession of a controlled substance, tampering with a witness and retaliation. He and his church are also facing five lawsuits, three of them a result of the sexual assault cases.
Also, Mr. Hornbuckle’s case was transferred last week from state District Judge James Wilson’s court to state District Judge Scott Wisch, according to court documents. Judge Wilson recused himself from the case, but no reasons were given in that document.
DAVENPORT (IA)
Des Moines Register
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
December 20, 2005
The Davenport diocese is searching for a priest accused of sexually abusing children.
The Rev. William Wiebler, who is facing several sexual abuse lawsuits, has left a treatment program in St. Louis and has not made contact with church officials.
The diocese is ‘‘concerned that he’s running around loose in St. Louis,’’ said Rand Wonio, the diocese’s attorney.
‘‘We know the Archdiocese of St. Louis didn’t want him there. We sent a letter to the prosecuting attorney in St. Louis just to let them know he was there.’’
Wiebler left the Quad-Cities in 1985 and has been accused of abuse dating to the 1970s and 1980s. He moved to St. Louis more than a year ago and was ordered by the diocese to stay in a treatment program and avoid contact with minors, Wonio said.
SEATTLE (WA)
Seattle Weekly
by Nina Shapiro
A lawyer is deposing a potential witness in the case of a woman who alleges that in the 1970s, when a child, she was abused and impregnated by a Jesuit priest in Alaska. The lawyer represents her, and the man he is questioning, in preparation for trial, is a key figure who later served as the priest's supervisor. Key and prominent. Father Stephen Sundborg today is president of Seattle University.
Sundborg has just said that he can't talk about conversations he had with Father James Poole about sexual behavior because they were confidential communication between a priest and his supervisor, called "manifestation of conscience." At the time of those conversations with Poole in the early to mid-1990s, Sundborg was head of a regional Jesuit domain known as the Oregon Province.
Deposing Sundborg on Oct. 11, attorney John Manly offers a fantastical scenario to discern just how far the university president is willing to take such secrecy.
Manly: "If a priest while you were provincial, manifested to you that he had raped a seven- or eight-year-old little girl on the day of her first communion, he chopped her head off after the rape, buried her body, had sex with her body after he chopped her head off and was hiding it, and you knew that the parents and the police were looking for that child, would you alert the authorities?"
Sundborg: "There is nothing that is said that I would learn in a manifestation of conscience that I would reveal to another person."
Manly: "So you wouldn't tell the police in that situation."
Sundborg: "I would not."
MAINE
Portland Press Herald
By MARK PETERS, Portland Press Herald Writer
Maine's Catholic bishop has suspended a retired priest who was charged with groping a teenage boy in a Texas movie theater last week.
The decision by Bishop Richard Malone means the Rev. Paul Clogan, 74, can no longer minister to parishioners, including those at a church outside Austin where he agreed to serve as pastor after retiring last year. The suspension was up to Malone because Clogan was ordained in Maine, said Sue Bernard, spokeswoman for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland.
Clogan has not served in a Maine parish since the fall of 2000. He spent 18 months in the state, serving in Machias, Cherryfield and Waterville, after being ordained in May 1999 at age 68.
Malone is alerting those parishes of the suspension and pending criminal charge. The diocese received no allegations of wrongdoing by Clogan during his time at the Maine churches or when he served as hospital chaplain for a month in Bangor, Bernard said.
HUDSON (WI)
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Donna Halvorsen, Star Tribune
Last update: December 18, 2005 at 11:20 PM
In the months after her brother was murdered in a Hudson, Wis., funeral home in February 2002, Kathleen O'Connell was devastated when investigators couldn't crack the case.
Then a friend told her about the Vidocq Society, a little-known group of volunteer super-sleuths in Philadelphia. She began e-mailing immediately, pleading for help finding who had gunned down her brother Dan O'Connell, 39, and his employee, James Ellis, 22.
"Do you know how you grab onto anything for answers?" O'Connell said. "That's what I was doing."
Named for an 18th century French crook-turned-cop, the Vidocq Society is one of the best-known groups of "cold case cowboys," freelance forensic experts who have banded together to look at crimes that have stymied local law enforcement across the nation. ...
After Hudson detectives approved the society's involvement, members began reviewing the facts. The Rev. Ryan Erickson, a priest who had served in the area, became a strong suspect.
A motive for the murders also emerged: to silence Dan O'Connell, who was believed to have confronted the priest a day before the murders about alleged sexual abuse of boys.
WAUSAU (WI)
CBS 5
(AP) WAUSAU A state appeals court Tuesday upheld the 15-year prison sentence of a 77-year-old defrocked Roman Catholic priest convicted of sexually assaulting two adolescent brothers in 1978 in Outagamie County.
The 3rd District Court of Appeals rejected arguments from John Patrick Feeney that the six-year statute of limitations for charging him had expired. The panel also said there was sufficient evidence that Feeney touched the boys, then aged 12 and 14, for the purpose of sexual arousal and gratification.
An Outagamie County jury convicted Feeney in February 2004 of three counts of sexual assault of a child and one count of attempted sexual assault of a child. Feeney was parish priest at St. Nicholas Catholic Church in Freedom at the time.
The mother of the boys testified at Feeney's trial that she tried to go to church authorities in 1978 to report his behavior, and she also contacted a sheriff's deputy, but Feeney was never prosecuted.
PORTLAND (ME)
Boston.com
December 20, 2005
PORTLAND, Maine --Roman Catholic Bishop Richard Malone has suspended a retired priest's ability to minister following his arrest in Texas on charges of indecency with a minor, the Diocese of Portland announced Tuesday.
The Rev. Paul Clogan, who was ordained by the diocese in 1999, was arrested Friday after allegedly groping a 16-year-old boy during the movie "King Kong" in Marble Falls, Texas. Clogan was free on bond on Monday.
Clogan, 74, was born in Boston and raised his family in Texas.
The former English professor entered the ministry at age 68 and served briefly as a hospital chaplain in Bangor in 1999 before serving at Holy Name Parish in Machias and St. Michael Mission in Cherryfield. He returned to Texas to continue his ministry in November 2000.
DUBUQUE (IA)
Des Moines Register
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
December 19, 2005
Demonstrators in Dubuque urged action Monday from the head of Iowa’s Catholic bishops, saying Archbishop Jerome Hanus has not done enough to discipline a Sioux City priest accused of molesting boys.
The group, representing three support groups for clergy sex abuse victims, picketed outside the Dubuque Archdiocesan Center and submitted a letter to the archdiocese outlining its concerns.
Demonstrators said their main goal is seeking official sanctions against Bishop Emeritus Lawrence Soens of the Sioux City diocese. Soens retired in 1998 but has been accused in nine lawsuits of molesting boys while he was principal at Iowa City Regina High School and while he was rector of St. Ambrose Seminary in Davenport.
Soens, who last year settled one of the lawsuits and has denied all charges, has remained active, appearing with Hanus at an Oct. 30 Mass to honor the archbishop’s 10th anniversary heading the Dubuque archdiocese.
IRELAND
Irish Independent
David Quinn
Religious Correspondent
CATHOLIC Bishops are to hand over responsibility for the handling of child abuse claims to professionally qualified lay people.
The move is part of a radical new child protection policy and is a reflection of the loss of trust suffered by the bishops as a result of the spate of sex abuse scandals.
In future, the bishops will have no discretion over whether or not an allegation should be passed on to the civil authorities.
They will only have discretion over whether or not a priest should stand aside from his duties while the investigation into the allegation takes place.
A new "National Board" will oversee the policy and it is to be headed by Justice Anthony Hederman, the former Attorney General and Supreme Court judge.
ARLINGTON (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
By NATHANIEL JONES
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
An Arlington minister accused of sexually assaulting congregants walked out of jail Monday morning after posting $1.5 million bail.
Terry Hornbuckle, founder and lead pastor of Agape Christian Fellowship in south Arlington, had been jailed awaiting a hearing on six charges of sexual assault, a charge of tampering with a witness, a charge of retaliation against a witness and a charge of drug possession.
He had been held without bail during the past four months after violating conditions of his release a second time since his arrest in March on the sexual assault charges.
Meanwhile, Hornbuckle’s trial has been moved from state District Judge James R. Wilson’s court to state District Judge Scott Wisch’s court. The move comes after Hornbuckle’s attorney, Mike Heiskell, filed a motion to have Wilson recuse himself for an unexplained reason.
MISSOURI
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
By Robert Patrick
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
12/20/2005
An advocacy group for clergy sex abuse victims on Monday called for an independent investigation into sexual allegations against former Marianist Brother William Mueller and asked for more strongly worded letters seeking the help of alleged victims or witnesses in a criminal investigation.
Brother Stephen Glodek, head of the Marianist Province of the United States, agreed to send out letters Monday afternoon that contained more detail about the allegations.
David Clohessy, national director of the Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, called the almost 5,000 letters that were sent to alumni earlier this year short, pathetic and vague. Clohessy said letters should acknowledge the abuse and aggressively seek out anyone with information.
But Glodek and a Marianist spokeswoman, Diane Guerra, said Marianist officials were limited by liability issues due to pending lawsuits, and stressed that the allegations against Mueller have not been proven. Glodek has spent months talking to former students, officials and school employees about Mueller.
Des Moines Register
By BILL LaHAY
SPECIAL TO THE REGISTER
December 20, 2005
It's been more than a decade since the first media reports of the sex-abuse scandal began rocking the Catholic church. In news coverage, that's a geologic age. But as the recent grand jury report out of Philadelphia reveals, the stream of charges and legal battles surrounding this crisis shows no sign of slowing.
Catholics who long nostalgically for quieter times should know that patience and passivity will not put an end to this tiresome mess. From the abuse itself to its subsequent cover-up, this great shame of the church festered in a legacy of silence that feeds it still.
The silence took the victims first. As children paralyzed by a profound sense of shame and betrayal, most of us were literally dumbstruck by what happened. Who would believe us? Often threatened by our abusers, we said nothing and assumed we were alone.
Then the silence claimed more turf. Cardinals and bishops, afraid of the legal and financial fallout or dismissive of the severity of the abuse and its consequences, chose to tell no one. Instead, they ordered confidential and often perfunctory counseling for abusers, or reassigned offending priests to unsuspecting new parishes where many abused again. When bolder victims or their parents confronted the church, silence was again part of the cure: quietly settled claims that required confidentiality agreements.
CALIFORNIA
Santa Cruz Sentinel
By Cathy Smith
sentinel staff writer
After deliberating for less than a day, jurors Monday found a former Watsonville pastor and school district employee guilty of the four counts of child molestation.
Steven Montez Martinez, 49, of Watsonville faces from probation to five years in prison when sentenced Jan. 20, prosecutor Dave Sherman said.
Martinez showed little emotion as he left the courtroom late Monday, though his family members cried as they embraced one another.
Martinez was arrested in November 2004 and charged with four incidents of molesting a 14-year-old girl in late 1993 or early 1994, while she was a freshman at Aptos High School.
IRELAND
Irish Times
Patsy McGarry Religious Affairs Correspondent
Catholic Archbishop Seán Brady yesterday committed the church in Ireland to implementing child protection guidelines that aim "to ensure that where the church is, children are safe".
Archbishop Brady said the guidelines were designed to ensure "the painful mistakes of the past will never happen again".
The new guidelines were welcomed by the Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children, Brian Lenihan, and by the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.
However, some abuse victims expressed disappointment. Colm O'Gorman of One in Four said the church had failed to meet the standards demanded by the Ferns Report. "We've moved backwards not forwards," he said.
The guidelines were sponsored by the Irish Bishops' Conference, the Conference of Religious of Ireland, and the Irish Missionary Union. Among the child protection measures included are:
A national board for child protection chaired by retired Supreme Court judge Anthony Hederman. It will be made up of parents and professionals in the areas of child care, psychology, theology, law, academia, education and business.
COVINGTON (KY)
The Cincinnati Post
By Paul A. Long
Post staff reporter
Two objections were filed Monday - the final day for lodging such exceptions - to a proposed $120 million settlement of a class-action, sexual-abuse lawsuit against the Diocese of Covington.
The two documents were filed under seal in Boone Circuit Court, so it's unknown who filed them or what the specific objections are. They cannot be opened without a judicial order.
The proposed settlement between the diocese and those who sued alleging a half-century of sexual abuse by priests and a cover-up by diocesan officials would be a record in the U.S. if it stands
Some 373 people have filed informal claims to receive a part of the settlement.
MEXICO
10 News
EL CENTRO, Mexico -- A Catholic priest wanted for allegedly committing six counts of sexual misconduct with a minor and five counts of sexual abuse was arrested in El Centro Friday.
According to authorities, Joseph Cervantes Briceno has been on the run since 2003 when he was indicted in Arizona for sexual misconduct.
Briceno is accused of engaging in sexual misconduct with a teenage boy and the boy's sister.
Deputy U.S. Marshals developed information that Briceno was hiding out at a Catholic Church in Mexicali.
SPOKANE (WA)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SPOKANE -- The Catholic Diocese of Spokane plans advertisements seeking alleged victims of sexual abuse by priests who have not come forward to file a complaint.
As part of its bankruptcy case, the church hopes the $160,000 campaign will help determine how many people were abused by clergy in Eastern Washington. The deadline to file is March 10.
Ads are to appear in USA Today and the Jan. 8 western edition of Parade Magazine, as well as in newspapers in Washington state.
The move resembles that of the Archdiocese of Portland, the first in the nation to file for bankruptcy in the face of mounting sex abuse claims, which began running ads in January to alert victims of an April deadline.
FALL RIVER (MA)
Boston Globe
By Jonathan Saltzman and Charles Radin, Globe Staff | December 20, 2005
A state appeals court overturned yesterday the conviction of a Fall River man who had been jailed on charges of molesting two adolescent female relatives, citing an ''egregiously improper" closing argument last year by a Bristol County prosecutor who invoked the clergy sex-abuse scandal.
The three-member panel said that an assistant Bristol County district attorney, Jennifer Rose, should not have mentioned the scandal in the Catholic Church to suggest why two sisters waited a year to tell their mother that Luís Vázquez had molested them in late 2000 or early 2001.
Rose's argument was especially improper, the judges said, because Vázquez was tried in Fall River District Court at the time a petition regarding James R. Porter, the former priest, was pending in Bristol County Superior Court. Fall River is in Bristol County, and, the judges said, ''the Porter case and the wounds that it caused to the Fall River community again were in the public eye."
TEXAS
American-Statesman
By Tony Plohetski
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Tuesday, December 20, 2005
The 16-year-old boy was sitting alone in the Marble Falls movie theater Friday evening when, police say, a 74-year-old priest sat next to him, even though there were plenty of other empty seats.
Then, about an hour into "King Kong," police said, the Rev. Paul Clogan reached over and groped the teenager.
The boy ran out of the theater and told the manager, who called police. Capt. F.T. Goodwin said officers arrived minutes later and arrested Clogan as he left the movie.
Clogan has been released from the Burnet County Jail after posting bail. He could not be reached for comment Monday. Church officials said Clogan had hired an attorney but declined to provide the lawyer's name.
ANCHORAGE (AK)
KTUU
Monday, December 19, 2005 - by Angela Unruh
Anchorage, Alaska - New sexual abuse accusations have been leveled against a former Kenai priest.
A Kenai woman going by the name ‘Jane Doe’ filed a lawsuit in the superior court for the state of Alaska, alleging eight years of sexual abuse at the hands of Roman Catholic priest, Father Robert Wells, who passed away in 1992.
The lawsuit claims wells abused Jane Doe sometime between 1974 and 1988 beginning when she was just 9 years old. It allegedly occurred while Wells served as a priest at Our Lady of the Angels Parish in Kenai.
BATON ROUGE (LA)
The Advocate
By ADRIAN ANGELETTE
aangelette@theadvocate.com
Advocate staff writer
The Diocese of Baton Rouge and several former altar boys who claim they were sexually abused years ago by a priest have settled lawsuits.
Felecia Peavy, the Houston attorney representing men who say former priest Christopher Springer abused them when they were altar boys, said exact terms of the settlements can't be disclosed.
The cases remain under seal in state district court in Baton Rouge and are not open for public review.
Peavy said the diocese agreed to a monetary settlement with four of the altar boys she represents and will also pay for therapy and medical treatment. Negotiations are continuing with two other former altar boys who accuse Springer of abusing them.
"I'm hoping for a settlement before the next hearing date," Peavy said Monday. "It was a long, hard-fought battle. It was contentious. But I think it has been well worth the effort because now the diocese can safely say they put forth the effort to resolve the problem."
IOWA
Des Moines Register
By SHIRLEY RAGSDALE
REGISTER RELIGION EDITOR
December 20, 2005
For the second time in a week, representatives of victims' advocate organizations have approached Catholic hierarchy asking to be heard, only to be turned away.
On Monday, representatives of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, Catholics for Spiritual Healing of Grand Mound and Concerned Catholics of the Davenport Diocese demonstrated outside the Dubuque Archdiocese chancery. The group was asking that Archbishop Jerome Hanus take the lead on sanctioning former Sioux City Bishop Lawrence Soens, who has been accused of molesting students at Iowa City Regina High School.
Last week, the group demonstrated outside St. Mary's Catholic Church in Riverside, where about 80 priests were receiving training. The Dec. 13 training event, sponsored by the Davenport Diocese, was scheduled after priests asked Bishop William Franklin for help in ministering to sex abuse victims.
Times Staff and Wire Reports
ARIZONA
Los Angeles Times
A Catholic priest who had been indicted in Arizona on charges of sexually abusing minors was arrested in Mexicali and deported to the United States, the U.S. marshal's office said Monday.
Joseph Cervantes Briceno, a fugitive since 2003, was a parish priest in rural Mexicali before being arrested by Mexican authorities. He is in an El Centro jail awaiting extradition to Arizona.
IRELAND
Catholic World News
Dublin, Dec. 19 (CWNews.com) - The Irish Catholic bishops announced a new national policy to combat the sexual abuse of children at a news conference on December 19.
Archbishop Sean Brady of Armagh, who chaired the news conference, said that the Irish bishops' policy was based on the principle that "the welfare of the child is paramount." He announced that Mr. Justice Anthony Hederman, a former attorney general and Supreme Court judge, would chair a new national board to oversee the child-protection effort.
The board, Archbishop said, would be composed of "parents and professionals from child care, psychology, theology, law, academia, education, and business." Bishop Colm O'Reilly of Ardagh, speaking at the same event, said that the board would be responsible for compiling nationwide reports on child abuse by Church personnel.
IOWA
KWWL
A group of eastern Iowans hope the support of an archbishop will lead to the defrocking of a former Sioux City bishop.
The Survivor Network of those Abused by Priests, or "SNAP," was in Dubuque asking Archbishop Jerome Hanus for help. The person SNAP would like to see defrocked is retired Sioux City Bishop Lawrence Soens. The group claims the bishop is guilty of 10 molestation charges, but seems to have escaped consequences.
On Monday, SNAP members met outside the Catholic Archdiocesan Headquarters. Their goal was to deliver a letter to Archbishop Hanus asking for his help in the removal or defrocking of Bishop Soens. SNAP members think action started in Dubuque could be the first step towards what they feel is justice.
Steve Theisen is the director of Iowa SNAP and says, "I don't know if bishop hanus has the authority to take action but he can at least get it to rome and get it moving so that children here in Iowa are protected."
IRELAND
RTE News
19 December 2005 16:06
The Minister of State at the Department of Health and Children has welcomed the new child protection guidelines unveiled by the Catholic Church earlier today.
Brian Lenihan described the policies as a step in the right direction. He added that his officials will now review the guidelines and if there is any problem they will get back to the bishops.
The ISPCC has also welcomed the new guidelines. The child protection society described the new guidelines as a progressive statement of the church's commitment to nurturing and protecting children.
UNITED KINGDOM
News Letter
Monday 19th December 2005
A catholic priest from Fermanagh appeared in court in Liverpool on Saturday charged with indecent assault and facilitation of the rape of a 12-year-old girl.
Jeremiah McGrath, 62, was arrested in Northern Ireland on Wednesday after going voluntarily to Enniskillen police station.
McGrath, of, Rosslea, is accused of indecently assaulting the girl and facilitating another person to rape her between May and November of this year in England.
NEW JERSEY
The Press of Atlantic City
Published: Sunday, December 18, 2005
Updated: Sunday, December 18, 2005
For too long, churches and other nonprofit organizations that negligently or knowingly employed sexual predators who abused the group's members have been protected from legal action by state law.
Now that law is just one signature away from being changed to allow childhood victims to sue the agencies that employed their abusers.
It's about time.
Thursday, the state Senate voted 34 to 1 to pass a bill that will modify the Charitable Immunity Act — an act that has protected nonprofit organizations from being held legally responsible for harboring a sexual predator as an employee.
BRAZIL
Zenit
BRASILIA, Brazil, DEC. 18, 2005 (Zenit.org).- The president of the Brazilian bishops' conference assailed as groundless a magazine report that claims 1,700 priests in the country are involved in sexual abuse.
Cardinal Geraldo Majilla Agnello, archbishop of San Salvador of Bahia, criticized the report that appeared in ISTOÉ. Details of the magazine report receive worldwide press attention.
"This grave declaration which is published as something proven is a calumnious declaration, which moreover lacks any solid base," said the prelate.
In a letter to the editor of the magazine, the cardinal said: "Could it be that the magazine and/or the author of the report don't know what a 'sexual crime' is, and that it is a legal figure predicted by the legal code? To declare in a magazine such as ISTOÉ that 10% of the Catholic clergy of Brazil is involved in 'sexual crimes,' without rightful proof, is a crime substantiated by the laws of the country
IRELAND
The Belfast Telegraph
Broadcaster and writer Father Brian D'Arcy (60) is one of the Catholic church's best advertisments - and fiercest critics. He tells Janet Devlin about his anger over the church's child sex abuse scandals, why priests should be allowed to marry and how he's thought about giving up his ministry, butjust can't do it
19 December 2005
I don't know if Father Brian D'Arcy has a cv. But if he does, it might read: Superior of the Passionist Order, journalist, country music fan, and sometime thorn in the side of the Catholic church. The fact that he doesn't look or act particularly bloody-minded must make it difficult for detractors to paint him as the proverbial bad apple in the clerical barrel.
If Hollywood were to come a-knocking (with, say, a screenplay of his part in ransoming IRA kidnap victim John O'Grady, who had two fingers hacked off by the Border Fox in 1987) it's much more likely he would be played by Tom Courtenay, to whom he bears a passing resemblance, than Mickey Rourke.
And perhaps his quiet charm and fierce intelligence are just what the Catholic church, an organisation charged with bringing light and love into the world, needs in these dark days.
The sheer scale of sexual abuse of children by Catholic priests, as exposed by the recent Ferns Report, has shaken the church in Ireland to its very foundations.
Meanwhile, the church in the United States is being practically bankrupted by an avalanche of claims from young adults who suffered decades of abuse.
SCOTLAND
The Sunday Mail
By Marion Scott
Ms A was just eight years old when she was raped by a priest.
The incident happened in 1966 in a Catholic care home in the west coast of Scotland.
She says the attack started when she was sexually assaulted by a nun.
Ms A said: "I was screaming in pain, distraught and terrified.
"But the nun kept shouting I was the Devil and that I was evil. While the nun held me down, he raped me.
SIOUX FALLS (SD)
Argus Leader
Article Published: 12/18/05, 2:55 am
The Catholic Diocese of Sioux Falls continues to seek those who might have been sexually abused by a priest or other representative of the diocese.
"We have been able to offer a variety of assistance to people," said Sister Mary Carole Curran, victim assistance coordinator for the diocese. Curran also is executive director for Catholic Family Services, which has offices across eastern South Dakota.
The diocese will host a Healing Mass at noon Monday at St. Joseph Cathedral, Fifth Street and Duluth Avenue.
DENVER (CO)
Denver Post
By Eric Gorski
Denver Post Staff Writer
The package arrived in Joe McGee's mailbox in September 1996. The Sterling insurance agent had waited a long time for this: a settlement offer crafted by attorneys for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Denver.
McGee hoped it would ease the anger he carried for 40 years against his childhood priest, the Rev. John Stein. McGee says Stein sexually abused him hundreds of times over a three-year period in the 1950s at St. Catherine of Siena parish in the plains town of Iliff.
McGee said he didn't closely read the 3½-page legal document before signing it.
He said he was angry after going back and forth with an archdiocesan official for five years about just compensation. He wanted to be done with it. He realizes now it was a mistake.
"When I look back, the thing that hurts the most is the isolation I lived in because I had to keep the secret," said McGee, 63.
CANON CITY (CO)
Daily Record
Allan M. Miller, a pastor of Victory Apostolic Church in Florence, has waived his right to a preliminary hearing on charges of sexual assault.
The 72-year-old pastor was initially arrested in late October on three counts of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust after allegedly having ongoing sexual contact with a 15-year-old parishioner.
Miller is expected to appear in court March 1, 2006.
SPOKANE (WA)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SPOKANE, Wash. -- The Catholic Diocese of Spokane plans advertisements seeking alleged victims of sexual abuse by priests who have not come forward to file a complaint.
As part of its bankruptcy case, the church hopes the $160,000 campaign will help determine how many people were abused by clergy in Eastern Washington. The deadline to file is March 10.
Ads are to appear in USA Today and the Jan. 8 western edition of Parade Magazine, as well as in daily and weekly newspapers in Washington state.
The move resembles that of the Archdiocese of Portland, the first in the nation to file for bankruptcy in the face of mounting sex abuse claims, which began running ads in January to alert victims of an April deadline.
SCOTLAND
The Sunday Mail
By Marion Scott
THE leaders of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland failed to alert police after 19 priests were accused of being paedophiles.
A damning document obtained by the Sunday Mail reveals how bishops in Scotland's eight dioceses did not call in detectives to probe sex abuse against the priests.
Most were allowed to continue in their posts or relocated to other parishes.
The bombshell report reveals 19 Scottish priests were accused of abuse between 1985 and 1995.
Only one was convicted after police were alerted by his bishop. Victims complained to police about nine of the other 18 but the church failed to inform the authorities about any.
UNITED KINGDOM
Sunday Independent
A CATHOLIC priest appeared in court in the UK yesterday charged with indecent assault and facilitation of the rape of a 12-year-old girl.
Father Jeremiah McGrath, 62, appeared in the dock at Liverpool Magistrates Court, following his arrest in Northern Ireland on Wednesday.
McGrath, who gave his address as the Parochial House, Rosslea, County Fermanagh, spoke only to confirm his name and address.
He is accused of indecently assaulting the girl and facilitating another person to rape her, between May and November of this year in England. McGrath was arrested on Wednesday after going voluntarily to Enniskillen Police Station.
He appeared in court yesterday, flanked by two prison officers, after being flown from Northern Ireland to Liverpool on Thursday.
MEMPHIS (TN)
WPTY
Posted: 12/16/2005 7:58:52 PM
The Memphis Catholic Diocese is under fire after more allegations of sexual abuse by priests.
Now, a national organization wants the church to begin investigating accusations against at least four local priests.
40-year-old Eugene Baltz says a local priest abused him when he was just 16. Baltz says he was raped and sodomized. He came forward in 2004 with his accusations and says the priest was reassigned. Baltz says the priest should have been removed from the pulpit altogether.
Baltz spoke publicly for the first time at a news conference on Friday. The news conference was put on by the Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. Members say they’re working to get justice for those who say they’ve lost their faith in the church.
NEW ZEALAND
Stuff
18 December 2005
By TARA ROSS
Tokelau's New Zealand administrator is sending a social worker to the island because of concern sexual abuse is being ignored.
Neil Walter is recruiting a two-person team to meet Tokelau's leaders and law enforcers in March to ensure they apply the law in sexual abuse cases.
Unease over two cases on the northern atoll of Atafu have divided the tiny territory, and some are saying it has become the new Pitcairn. Six Pitcairn Island men were convicted last year for sex offences dating back 40 years, and several others are awaiting trial on sex charges.
Walter said no legal action was taken against Atafu's pastor, Iosua Faamoni, who sexually abused his 12-year-old stepdaughter in 1992. He left the island after her revelation, but was allowed to return last year to run the church after he publicly confessed to his wrongdoing.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
By Robert Patrick
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
12/17/2005
SAN ANTONIO
The stories all start the same way.
Brother William "Bill" Mueller would pull high school boys out of class or buttonhole them in the hallway.
He would ask for their help on a science experiment, a secret project for his master's thesis in psychology or a project for church leaders on why priests or religious brothers were leaving. Other students allege that Mueller took them out of class for counseling.
After school or on weekends, in four schools in three states, Mueller would lead the students down long hallways to his office, the band room, a storage room, closet or another office, students say.
Some claim Mueller blindfolded them, made them hyperventilate, or pressed a strong-smelling cloth over their mouths and noses.
One alleged in a lawsuit that Mueller sneaked up behind him and pressed a cloth soaked with ether against his face, then sexually abused him. Another said Mueller fondled him while checking his compliance with the school dress code.
UNITED KINGDOM
IOL
17/12/2005 - 15:53:02
A Catholic priest appeared in court in England today charged with indecent assault and facilitation of the rape of a 12-year-old girl.
Father Jeremiah McGrath, 62, appeared in the dock at Liverpool Magistrates Court, following his arrest in Northern Ireland on Wednesday.
Fr McGrath, who gave his address as the Parochial House, Rosslea, Co Fermanagh, spoke only to confirm his name and address.
He is accused of indecently assaulting the girl and facilitating another person to rape her, between May and November of this year in England.
DAVENPORT (IA)
Quad-City Times
By Dustin Lemmon
The Catholic Diocese of Davenport has lost contact with a former Quad-City area priest accused of sexually abusing children.
Montgomery went to Wiebler’s residence and the bakery where he worked, but he was not at either location, Wonio said. Montgomery could not be reached for comment by the Quad-City Times.
The diocese does not have the legal authority to confine Wiebler to any area, but it has been trying to keep track of him, Wonio explained.
“It’s a frustrating situation because we really have no legal power over him,” he said. The diocese is “concerned that he’s running around loose in St. Louis.”
Bishop William Franklin has asked the Vatican to laicize or defrock Wiebler and four other priests over allegations of sexual abuse. Wiebler left the Quad-Cities in 1985 and has been accused of abuse dating to the 1970s and 1980s.
NORTHERN IRELAND
Irish Examiner
Police in Britain have arrested a Catholic priest from the North in connection with an investigation into "serious crime".
Sixty-three-year-old Fr Jeremiah McGrath was detained in Liverpool yesterday after arranging a meeting with local detectives.
The police have not revealed what he is being questioned about.
However, the PSNI searched Fr McGrath's house in Roslea, Co Fermanagh, two weeks ago and took a number of documents a way for examination.
That raid was believed to have been connected to a case in which a Co Antrim man was charged with child abduction and rape in Britain earlier this month.
NORTHERN IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph
By Jonathan McCambridge
16 December 2005
A Fermanagh priest was today still being questioned by police in Liverpool investigating serious crime.
Father Jeremiah McGrath (63), met detectives by arrangement yesterday and was taken to Merseyside for interviews.
His arrest follows searches carried out by police at the priest's Rosslea parochial house and the appearance of a Co Antrim man in a Liverpool court on child abduction and rape charges.
It is understood the man may have stayed at the priest's parochial house.
Merseyside police, accompanied by the PSNI, searched the parochial house two weeks ago.
A number of documents were taken away by detectives for further examination.
UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News
Police in Liverpool have been given more time to question a 63-year-old County Fermanagh priest.
Fr Jeremiah McGrath, whose parish is in Rosslea, was arrested on Thursday and taken to Merseyside, where police can now hold him until early on Saturday.
It is believed a man charged in England with child abduction and rape may have stayed at his parochial house.
ELKHORN (WI)
Janesville Gazette
(Published Saturday, December 17, 2005)
Gazette Staff
ELKHORN-A jury trial set for Donald J. McGuire, a 75-year-old retired Catholic priest, was delayed nearly a month Friday because a key prosecution witness was unavailable.
McGuire's trial will begin Feb. 17 and last through much of the next week. It had been slated to start Jan. 20.
McGuire, who is from Chicago, is accused of having repeated, inappropriate sexual contact with two boys at a Fontana lake home during the late 1960s.
UNITED KINGDOM
BBC News
A 63-year-old County Fermanagh priest has been charged by police in Liverpool investigating sex offences against children.
The priest was arrested on Thursday and taken to Merseyside for questioning.
He is due before Liverpool Magistrates Court later on Saturday charged with two counts of sex offences involving children.
UNITED STATES
The Pacific Northwest Inlander
by Kevin Taylor
When doing a Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization, file locally and settle globally. This seems to be the strategy in play by the Catholic Church.
Portland, Tucson and Spokane are vastly different in many ways, but in each city, the Catholic Church broke legal ground last year by filing Chapter 11 bankruptcies in federal court as a way to settle claims of child sexual abuse by clergy.
Strikingly, each diocese sought Chapter 11 protections just as a sex-abuse case was on the verge of trial. The closer a bishop gets to the witness stand, the more likely a bankruptcy filing becomes, Minnesota attorney Jeffrey Anderson told an Arizona newspaper weeks before the Portland diocese filed for Chapter 11 — successfully predicting the imminent actions of the Portland church leadership.
IRELAND
News 24
17/12/2005 10:40 - (SA)
Dublin - An Irish government body said on Friday it had received claims from nearly 15 000 people seeking compensation for abuse suffered in child care institutions, most of them run by the Roman Catholic church.
The Residential Institutions Redress Board (RIRB) said it had received a total of 14 768 application by a deadline on Thursday, and the final cost to the Irish taxpayer could exceed €1bn.
Education Minister Mary Hanafin told parliament earlier this week that the board had processed about 4 500 applications up to December 9 and paid out €332m in awards.
The applicants say they were abused in institutions that were funded by the state but mainly run by the Roman Catholic church.
PENNSYLVANIA
The Morning Call
By Chris Parker
Of The Morning Call
A second teen is suing the Schuylkill County high school track and field coach charged with molesting a teammate and secretly videotaping both girls undressing.
In a notice of intent to sue filed Dec. 8, the girl and her parents say they will seek at least $25,000 from Nativity BVM High School coach Daniel M. Shields, the school, the Allentown Catholic Diocese and Bishop Edward P. Cullen.
Efforts Friday to reach the girl's attorney, Edward M. Brennan of Pottsville, were unsuccessful.
Schuylkill County Judge Cyrus Palmer Dolbin on Thursday denied a request by Shields and diocese lawyers Joseph F. Leeson Jr. and Robert L. Goodman to dismiss a suit filed by the teen who was allegedly molested.Dolbin gave the defendants 30 days to respond to it.
PHOENIX (AZ)
KVOA
PHOENIX A fugitive priest wanted on eight counts of sex crimes involving two minors has been captured in Mexico and returned to the U-S today.
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office announced the arrest of Joseph Briceno.
He was located near the U-S-Mexico border at Calexico, California, through the joint efforts of law enforcement from Arizona, Nevada, California and Mexico.
Briceno was transferred to the custody of the U-S Marshall's Service and booked into jail in Imperial County, California.
WICHITA (KS)
KBSD
By Cindy Klose
KWCH 12 Eyewitness News
Friday, December 16, 2005
A former Wichita priest is cleared after the District Attorney decides not to file sexual assault charges against him.
Police investigated Father Nicholas Voelker after a woman claimed he sexually assaulted her. Peggy Warren came forward with the claim last week. She said she wanted to help other woman who had been abused.
The Wichita Catholic Diocese said the relationship between Voelker and Warren was consensual.
WASHINGTON
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
A story in Wednesday's Seattle Post-Intelligencer about the Rev. Stephen Sundborg contained inaccuracies and an omission.
Sundborg, during his tenure as Provincial of the Northwest Jesuits, had six annual hour-long conversations with priest James Poole that Sundborg characterizes as "accounts of conscience." Sundborg says Poole was required to reveal anything in his personal life that weighed on his conscience.
Sundborg says he is bound by church law not to reveal anything in those conversations and therefore cannot say whether Poole confessed to any criminal activity.
The P-I is aware of no evidence that Poole told Sundborg he had sexually abused minors.
Sundborg says that, in other discussions with Poole, the priest discussed sexual contact with adult women but did not confess to any improper sexual activity with minors.
Sundborg stressed that, although he could not have reported the contents of the confidential conversations to law enforcement authorities or anyone else, he could have acted on any information received by reassigning Poole or by taking any other action necessary to protect other potential victims from him. The P-I story omitted that fact.
Sundborg said he could and would have forwarded any report from a third party regarding improper sexual activity with a minor to law-enforcement authorities. He said that during his time as Provincial he did not receive such a report about Poole.
Sundborg said that after allegations of improper sexual activity with 10 to 12 adult women during Poole's previous assignment in Alaska came up in the early '90s, he removed Poole from his position in Tacoma and sent him to a treatment center for troubled clerics. When Poole returned to Tacoma, Sundborg said, he was closely monitored and counseled. When accusations about assaults on minor girls during Poole's time in Alaska surfaced in 2003, after Sundborg had left the post as Provincial, Poole was removed from the ministry.
Sundborg, who is now president of Seattle University, said in a deposition relating to a lawsuit about Poole that if he had heard of criminal acts from any priest in the "accounts of conscience" while he was a Provincial, he could not have reported them to authorities. He explained to the P-I that in such a situation he would try to get the priest to speak to him in an unrestricted conversation about those acts so that he could take action, and failing that would take any steps necessary to protect others from the offending priest.
MIDLAND (TX)
Reporter-Telegram
Bob Campbell
Staff Writer
Midland Reporter-Telegram
12/17/2005
Hearing attorneys' pre-trial arguments Friday in a lawsuit alleging the sexual abuse of a boy by his priest, District Judge George Gilles took the case under advisement and said he will make a ruling on whether it may proceed either next week or in early January.
Defense lawyers Don Griffis of San Angelo and Bill Clifton of Midland invoked a two-year statute of limitations they said expired in September last year with the now 22-year-old alleged victim having first made the allegations public at the Odessa Rape Crisis Center Sept. 19, 2002.
Representing the Catholic Diocese of San Angelo, Griffis said neither the diocese nor the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate of Texas, the priestly order of the Rev. Domingo Gonzalez Estrada, should be liable even if the priest did molest the boy six times between 1989 and 1994.
"Any such acts would have been a deviation from his employment and purely personal to him," said Griffis. "The duty of a priest is to reflect God's love and not his own sinful desires.
-
WICHITA (KS)
KAKA
KAKE News
Rachel Phillips
Priest AccusedA local priest accused of sexual abuse will not be charged, but the woman making the accusations is sticking with her story.
In a press conference today, District Attorney Nola Foulston says the state will not be filing any charges against the priest, believing the alleged incidents were consensual. This comes after a review of the case by the Wichita Police Department and the District Attorney's office. Foulston says the actions in this case are not considered abuse in Kansas or any other state.
Peggy Warren says the alleged touching happened on two different occasions: once in Wichita and once in Missouri. She tells KAKE News she's shocked by the D.A.'s decision. She admits she and the priest were fully clothed at the time of the alleged incidents, but says things went much furthur than kissing, claiming he rubbed his privates on her stomach. A board member of a victim's support group that works with Warren released a statement today saying she too was disappointed in the D.A.'s decision. The statements reads: "I'm also hopeful that others who have been hurt by him or witnessed abuse by him will find the courage to come forward. Not being charged and not being guilty are two different things."
NEW YORK
MichNews
By Matt C. Abbott
MichNews.com
Dec 16, 2005
The following are two (unedited) statements from the Archdiocese of Newark and the Diocese of Albany regarding the lawsuit filed by Father Robert Hoatson.
From James Goodness, director of communications for the Archdiocese of Newark:
I have stated on a number of occasions over the past few years that Fr. Robert Hoatson is a troubled individual. Based on information contained in his filing with the federal court yesterday, I can only reiterate this statement forcefully and unequivocally.
I will not deal with his personal allegations against several bishops, in particular Archbishop John Myers. These allegations are simply preposterous. I believe (a phrase that Fr. Hoatson is very quick to make use of in his filing) that Fr. Hoatson will carelessly and recklessly use falsehoods to draw attention to himself. In making these allegations, he sullies not the reputations of the individuals he is attempting to bring down, but rather his own reputation.
SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
KGW
03:27 PM PST on Friday, December 16, 2005
By WILLIAM MCCALL, AP Writer
Attorneys for alleged victims of priest sex abuse argued Friday they should be allowed to ask whether the highest-ranking American in the Vatican is following federal law or church doctrine when he takes an oath to tell the truth at a deposition next month.
Archbishop William Levada has agreed to be in San Francisco on Jan. 9 to be questioned by attorneys about his tenure as archbishop of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland from 1986-95.
The Portland archdiocese was the first diocese in the nation to declare bankruptcy when it filed for protection from creditors in July 2004, just before the scheduled start of jury trials for victims seeking more than $155 million in damages.
IRELAND
One in Four
A priest and former school principal has lost a High Court attempt to prevent his trial on 85 charges of indecent assault against a schoolboy.
However, the court granted him an injunction preventing his trial on one count of gross indecency against the boy's brother.
Both brothers allege the offences took place in the 1980s in a school where the applicant, then a brother with a religious order, was principal.
The first brother, A, alleged he was indecently assaulted while they were in his car on the way to hurling matches. He claimed he was also assaulted in his office and that the assaults stopped when he struck him with a hurl.
The second brother, B, claimed he was indecently assaulted once after the now 70-year-old priest placed him on his knee while sitting on a stairs in the school.
KANSAS
Wichita Eagle
Sedgwick County District Attorney Nola Foulston announced at 1:30 p.m. today that her office has made a decision concerning allegations against a priest.
Foulston told reporters, "This is not a priest abuse situation."
Her office will not bring charges against the priest, who had been accused by a former parishioner of sexual abuse.
Foulston said an investigation showed that there was no evidence that a crime had been committed.
The woman and priest had a consensual relationship that included kissing, hand-holding and embracing, Foulston said. "There was no sexual contact."
COVINGTON (KY)
The Cincinnati Post
By Kevin Eigelbach
Post staff reporter
Attorneys are still working on resolving issues in the proposed $120 million settlement of priest sexual abuse cases in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Covington.
They met again in federal court in Covington on Thursday for a status conference. No decisions were made, said attorney Stan Chesley.
"We're still working to resolve the insurance issues," said Chesley, a Cincinnati attorney who represents the victims who brought suit. "I'm cautiously optimistic."
Talks have been ongoing since July between the diocese, the plaintiffs and three insurance companies - the American Mutual Insurance Co., Catholic Mutual Relief Society and Catholic Relief Insurance Co.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Toledo Blade
By JIM PROVANCE
BLADE COLUMBUS BUREAU
COLUMBUS - A Roman Catholic bishop made an unprecedented appearance before a legislative committee yesterday, saying the church knows it has an obligation to help victims of sexual abuse at the hands of priests.
But Bishop Fred Campbell of the Diocese of Columbus, on the job just 11 months, told lawmakers that reviving civil cases as old as 35 years would endanger church resources used for charity and education without guaranteeing protection for children.
"Is the simple removal of the statute of limitations going to protect children?" Bishop Campbell asked the House Judiciary Committee. "Are we talking about identifying perpetrators or are we talking about protecting children?"
"It's one and the same," countered Rep. Sandra Harwood (D., Niles). "By identifying them, that's how you protect the children."
UTICA (NY)
WSTM
UTICA, N.Y. A priest who was defrocked five years ago after sex claims has pleaded not guilty to new sex charges involving children.
Thirty-eight-year-old James Tamburrino of Rome is accused of having a 15-year-old boy pose in a sexual way for a photograph. He was charged after another teen told police Tamburrino asked him to pose for photos.
The former priest is charged with using a child in a sexual performance, attempting to use a child in a sexual performance, possessing a sexual performance by a child and endangering the welfare of a child.
Tamburrino left a Bronx church in 2000 after he and three other priests were accused of paying a 16-year-old boy who worked as a church secretary for sex.
AUSTRALIA
ABC
A Catholic priest who sexually assaulted 11 boys at a Melbourne school has been jailed for a year.
Frank Klep was charged with 14 counts of sexual assault over offences committed at the Rupertswood Salesian College at Sunbury between 1973 and 1979.
All his victims were boys aged under 16.
They were assaulted under Klep's care at the college infirmary.
Judge Frances Hogan says she found sentencing difficult, and took into account that Klep selflessly dedicated his life to helping others as a priest.
AUSTRALIA
The Age
By Daniella Miletic
December 17, 2005
PRIEST who sexually assaulted 11 teenagers at a Melbourne college while they recovered in the school infirmary has been jailed.
Frank Gerard Klep will serve a non-parole period of one year in jail after being sentenced yesterday to three years with two years suspended for three years.
Klep, 62, molested boys aged between 12 and 17 when he was a teacher at the Salesian order's Rupertswood College in Sunbury in the 1970s.
Klep pleaded guilty in the County Court to 14 charges of unlawful and indecent assault on students recovering in the infirmary, which he supervised.
SCRANTON (PA)
Times Leader
By MARK GUYDISH
mguydish@leader.net
SCRANTON – The accused priest was convicted more than a decade ago and is dead. The Diocese of Scranton has had three bishops since the alleged sex abuse occurred. The statute of limitations has expired. The victim moved to Kentucky.
None of which stopped David Irvin, now in his 40s, from filing a federal lawsuit Tuesday contending he was abused at age 6 by the Rev. Robert Caparelli, and that the diocese caused it through a deliberate pattern of “fraudulent representations, concealing criminal activity, obstructing justice” and “evading” liability.
“Mr. Irvin wants to know how this could happen in his church,” attorney Joseph Saunders said during a press conference held Tuesday morning on the steps of the federal courthouse.
The 31-page suit claims Caparelli repeatedly abused Irvin for several years when he lived in Lakeville and attended St. Mary’s Church. The alleged abuse started in 1969. Caparelli was convicted on multiple counts of sexual abuse of minors in the early 1990s. He died in prison in 1994.
WOODLAWN (MD)
Baltimore Sun
By Nick Shields
Sun reporter
Originally published December 16, 2005
For the second time in a month, a leader at a church in the Woodlawn area of Baltimore County has been charged with sexually abusing a teenager.
Gary Warren Warfield, described in court records as a deacon at Redemption Christian Fellowship, has been charged with sexually abusing a 17-year-old boy at the church. Last month, Gerald Fitroy Griffith, a pastor at the church, was charged with sexually abusing that boy and two other teenagers during counseling sessions.
An attorney for Warfield said yesterday that Warfield denies the allegations. A lawyer who represents Griffith said that many in the congregation stand behind the pastor.
According to charging documents filed Wednesday in District Court, a 17-year-old boy told a social worker last month that Warfield, 44, of the first block of Fallridge Court in Gwynn Oak, touched him improperly starting when he was 14. The boy said the last incident occurred in September, according to the court records. He said that he told Warfield to stop and that Warfield replied, "It's not like that. I'm just showing you my love," court papers say.
WOODLAWN (MD)
WJZ
(WJZ/AP) Woodlawn, MD A second leader at a church near Woodlawn has been charged with sexually abusing a teenager.
Forty-four-year-old Gary Warfield of Gwynn Oak is accused of abusing a 17-year-old boy at the Redemption Christian Fellowship, where court papers say Warfield is a deacon. Charging documents say the alleged abuse began when the boy was 14 and continued until September.
Warfield, through his attorney, is denying the allegations.
Last month, a pastor at the church, Gerald Griffith of Bowie was charged with sexually abusing the boy and two other teenagers during counseling sessions.
UTICA (NY)
New York Newsday
December 15, 2005, 10:29 PM EST
UTICA, N.Y. (AP) _ A former priest defrocked five years ago over sex abuse claims faces new criminal charges in Oneida County.
James Tamburrino, 38, of Rome, N.Y., pleaded not guilty Wednesday to using a child in a sexual performance, attempting to use a child in a sexual performance, possessing a sexual performance by a child and two misdemeanor counts of endangering the welfare of a child.
Tamburrino was charged after a teen reported to police that the former priest asked him to pose for photographs, said Assistant District Attorney Dawn Catera Lupi. An investigation found that Tamburrino took pictures another 15-year-old boy in July.
He was free on $20,000 bond pending a Jan. 3 court appearance.
COLUMBUS (OH)
The Plain Dealer
Friday, December 16, 2005
Julie Carr Smyth
Plain Dealer Bureau
Columbus - Giving victims of priest sex abuse a new opportunity to file lawsuits would jeopardize the positive work of the church, violate the Constitution, and undermine "the stability and finality of law," a Catholic bishop testified Thursday.
Amid intense questioning by the Ohio House Judiciary Committee, Bishop Frederick Campbell of the Diocese of Columbus also conceded that church leaders are worried about the financial ramifications of the sex-abuse proposal.
The bill, sponsored by State Sen. Bob Spada, a North Royalton Republican, requires immediate reporting by church leaders of all denominations of sexual acts against children. It also allows abuse victims a year to file for civil damages in cases from up to 35 years ago, and extends the statute of limitations on future cases to 20 years.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Cincinnati Enquirer
By Carrie Spencer Ghose
The Associated Press
COLUMBUS - The Roman Catholic Bishop of Columbus fielded tough questions from state legislators about sexual abuse in the church and said it would be bad public policy to allow lawsuits over past abuse cases that are decades old.
Roman Catholic Church officials are fighting a bill that would allow victims of sexual abuse by priests to file lawsuits over alleged abuse that happened as early as 1970.
Columbus Bishop Frederick Campbell and other church officials testified Thursday to a House committee. Church officials have been lobbying against the bill since the Senate passed it unanimously in March.
Campbell said the bill could be unconstitutional and would not protect children in the future.
SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
Contra Costa Times
By Kim Curtis
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN FRANCISCO - Pope Benedict XVI has appointed the current bishop of Salt Lake City to lead the San Francisco archdiocese, which is considered by many to be among the most liberal in the nation.
Monsignor George Niederauer, 69, had served as bishop for the Salt Lake City diocese for about a decade. He began the job in San Francisco on Thursday and will be formally installed Feb. 15.
During a news conference, Niederauer said he was looking forward to meeting and working with San Francisco's community because it's "richly varied -- socially, ethnically and culturally." ...
Nonetheless, at least two survivors of sexual abuse by priests showed up at the news conference to meet Niederauer and give him a letter written on behalf of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests or SNAP. They asked Niederauer to confront "the unfinished business" that former Archbishop William Levada left behind.
They urged him to release the names of potentially dangerous priests, suspend accused priests and reach out to heal the survivors of sex abuse, according to the letter.
NEW YORK
Newsday
BY CAROL EISENBERG
STAFF WRITER
December 16, 2005
A Newark priest has sued New York Cardinal Edward Egan and several other top church officials for $5 million, contending that he was terminated as a school director in 2003 for speaking out against bishops' cover-ups of clergy sex abuse.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday by the Rev. Robert Hoatson in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, also alleges that Egan, along with Newark Archbishop John J. Myers and Albany Bishop Howard Hubbard, are "active homosexuals," who protected predatory priests out of fear those men might reveal their own secrets.
While the suit claims that Hoatson "has personal knowledge" of the prelates' sexual activity, it provides no evidence to back that up. Hoatson's lawyer, John A. Aretakis, said Thursday several priests have agreed to provide "first-hand evidence of the sexual proclivities of the men we have mentioned when they are subpoenaed and put under oath."
Joseph Zwilling, a spokesman for Egan, dismissed the allegations as "not only false, but libelous and malicious. There's not a word of truth to this."
PUEBLO (CO)
The Pueblo Chieftain
By PATRICK MALONE
THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN
The Catholic Diocese of Pueblo has denied a request by The Pueblo Chieftain to inspect files it keeps on clergy accused of molestation.
In a letter received by the newspaper on Tuesday, Bishop Arthur Tafoya denied the request to make the files on Roncalli High School, Marianist Brother William Mueller and former priest Andrew Burke available.
"(The files) are primarily personnel records and therefore are confidential and entitled to the right of privacy," the bishop wrote. "The Diocese of Pueblo, just as any private employer, must restrict access to the personnel records."
The bishop's letter was in response to a Nov. 25 request from the newspaper to review files related to Roncalli High School, Mueller, Burke and Bishop Charles Buswell, who headed the diocese during the alleged acts of abuse.
CALIFORNIA
Orange County Weekly
by GUSTAVO ARELLANO
For years, Catholic Diocese of Orange Bishop Tod D. Brown ignored the pleas of sex-abuse victims who wanted His Eminence to release priest personnel files. The victims claimed those documents would prove church leaders knew about the pedophiles under their watch for decades but did nothing or—worse—shuffled them around. A Los Angeles Superior Court judge finally ordered Brown to release the personnel files in May, and the accusations of cover-up became fact.
At more than 1,000 pages, the personnel file on Father Eleuterio Ramos is the largest of any of the files released for a child-molesting Orange County priest. Page after page reveals how almost every major leader in the Orange diocese—from Bishop William Johnson to Bishop Michael Driscoll to Bishop John T. Steinbock to Bishop Norman McFarland to Bishop Jaime Soto—had a part in the Ramos scandal. Here are the highlights:
•Undated memo written by Michael Driscoll—then vicar general for the Orange diocese, now bishop of the Diocese of Boise—notes “obscene words—gestures. Bad judgment. Immature acts. Offered boys drinks (alcoholic). Boys out late at night.”
•Undated, anonymous memo states, “Movies, drinking. Boys from Placentia offered drink.”
CALIFORNIA
Orange County Weekly
by GUSTAVO ARELLANO
(Editor’s note: the names of sex-abuse victims are pseudonyms.)
The blood. And shit. And semen. Robert can’t get it out of his mind, his dreams, his life.
He was 14 in the summer of 1984. He had moved with his family to Texas sometime before and now, on summer vacation, had returned with them to visit friends and old neighbors in Santa Ana. While in his former hometown, Robert’s family ran into their old parish priest, Father Eleuterio Ramos. Ramos had tickets to the Olympic gold-medal soccer game at the Rose Bowl that week. He had invited Robert’s former neighbor, Michael, but Michael refused. Robert agreed.
The day before the match, Robert and Ramos spent the day in Tijuana. They rode horses, ate lunch and, despite Robert’s youth, knocked back beers. They crossed the border and visited a porn store in San Diego, where they were going to stay the night. As Robert skimmed through the movies, he noticed Ramos talking to three strangers who eyed Robert and occasionally nodded.
COLUMBUS (OH)
WBNS
Dec 15, 2005, 04:27 PM EST Bishop Gives Testimony on Bill
Reported by Tanisha Mallett
The leader of Columbus' Catholic Diocese testified against a proposal that could bring more abuse cases against the church.
The child protection bill would include a one-year "look back" period which allows victims of decades old abuse cases to sue.
The bishop says this chance to look back would not protect children in the future.
Bishop Frederick Campbell testified the church supports a child protection bill, just not the one- year "look back" window that comes with it.
SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
foxreno.com
POSTED: 9:42 am PST December 15, 2005
UPDATED: 10:10 am PST December 15, 2005
SAN FRANCISCO -- Pope Benedict XVI named George Niederauer -- the bishop of Salt Lake City -- to become the ninth archbishop of San Francisco, the Vatican said Thursday.
Niederauer, 69, had served as bishop for the Salt Lake City diocese for about a decade. A native of Los Angeles, he went to Stanford for his freshman year in college before transferring to St. John's Seminary in Camarillo. He was ordained in 1962 and appointed to the eighth bishop of Salt Lake City -- a diocese of more than 100,000 Catholics -- in November 1994. ...
Niederauer, who received the Gandhi Peace Award from the Gandhi Alliance for Peace in 2004, was on the committee that authored the Charter To Protect Young People -- the church's new doctrine on priests accused of sexual molestation.
However, he did raise a few eyebrows when he wrote a letter to a Los Angeles judge asking for leniency for a priest that had been convicted of 25 counts of child abuse.
Healy brushed aside any concerns for a diocese that is nearing the end of millions of dollars in litigation of some 45 abuse cases.
"The Diocese of San Francisco is close to resolving all those lawsuits," Healy said. "So I think it's a good opportunity for the archbishop to come in and remind the church what it's all about -- it's about proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ, it's about personal holiness and personal salvation. He is the right person at the right time."
IRELAND
RTE News
15 December 2005 17:22
Today is the deadline for receipt of compensation claims from survivors of institutional abuse to the Residential Institutions Redress Board.
To date, the board has made around 4,500 awards - people based in 22 countries throughout the world have made claims.
The scheme, which was established by the Government three years ago, has been receiving more than 600 applications a month, bringing its total to date to approximately 10,000.
ALBANY (NY)
WTEN
(posted: December 15th 8:45am) Convicted sex offender and former Christian Brothers Academy teacher, Beth Geisel, was released from the Albany County Jail this morning.
Geisel was sentenced to six months in jail after admitting to sleeping with a 16-year-old student. She was discharged early due to time served and good behavior.
Upon her release, Geisel seemed very calm, but offered no comment to News 10. She was picked up by an employee of her attorney's law firm, and taken directly to a local rehab center.
LEESBURG (VA)
Washington Post
By Rosalind S. Helderman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 15, 2005; Page LZ01
A former Roman Catholic priest at a Leesburg church was sentenced Monday to two years' probation, and not prison time, for attempting to gain access to online child pornography, after Loudoun County Commonwealth's Attorney James E. Plowman (R) made no sentencing recommendation to the judge.
A victims advocacy group had called for Robert C. Brooks, 73, who faced as much as five years in prison, to receive time behind bars for the felony charge. A spokesman for the group said after the hearing at the Loudoun Circuit Court that Plowman should have recused himself from the case because he belongs to St. John the Apostle Roman Catholic Church. Brooks was a minister at the church for 14 years.
Plowman "was a weak and feckless advocate up there," said Paul Steidler, spokesman for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. "I don't think the taxpayers of Loudoun County got their money's worth."
Plowman said that he joined the church in summer 2004, shortly before Brooks was charged, and that his membership did not affect his handling of the case.
UTAH
KSL
December 14th, 2005 @ 5:49pm
John Hollenhorst Reporting
Ward Jeffs, Warren Jeffs' Brother: "And he must be brought to justice. He's not beyond the law even if he holds some title of a prophet of a church. He has to be stopped."
A brother and a nephew of fugitive polygamist leader Warren Jeffs today accused him of sexually abusing young boys and girls for many years. And they laid the blame on Jeffs for a tragic family suicide.
Jeffs' relatives say he took advantage of his position in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, using threats of hellfire to force sex acts on boys and girls as young as five-years old.
It's clear that religious and sexual turmoil have torn the Jeffs family apart. If the allegations we heard today are true, it's also clear there are crimes in the polygamist community that are not victimless crimes.
UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune
By Peg McEntee
and Brooke Adams
The Salt Lake Tribune
After 17 months of silence, the man who filed a lawsuit accusing polygamist leader Warren Jeffs of raping him as a child has come forward to, in his words, "take a stand on this and take him down."
Brent Jeffs, now 22, on Wednesday repeated the allegations he made in his July 2004 lawsuit: that in the late 1980s, Warren Jeffs, his uncle, sodomized him in the Salt Lake Valley compound then owned by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS). Brent Jeffs said he was 5 or 6 at the time, and that Warren Jeffs' brothers, also named in the lawsuit, watched and participated in the abuse.
He said he decided to come forward now because of actions by Utah and Arizona to protect church assets held in its United Effort Plan, which holds all FLDS property in trust. In particular, authorities in both states want to make sure that residents of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., are not in peril of losing their homes if the UEP defaults on its obligations to them.
COLUMBUS (OH)
The Beacon Journal
CARRIE SPENCER GHOSE
Associated Press
COLUMBUS, Ohio - Roman Catholic Church officials are fighting a bill that would allow victims of sexual abuse by priests to file lawsuits over alleged abuse that happened as early as 1970.
Columbus Bishop Frederick Campbell and other church officials were to testify Thursday to a House committee. Church officials have been lobbying against the bill since the Senate passed it unanimously in March.
An advocate for the victims said the lineup of those scheduled to speak is significant for who's missing - more Ohio bishops.
Church officials don't oppose the main part of the bill, requiring church employees to report suspected abuse. They want to remove a provision that allows alleged victims to sue over past abuse for one to two years from the bill's passage, said Timothy Luckhaupt, executive director of the Catholic Conference of Ohio.
WASHINGTON
The Seattle Times
By Jonathan Martin and Peter Lewis
Seattle Times staff reporters
In the early 1990s, a Jesuit priest in Tacoma, facing allegations of fondling young women, met with his superior for spiritual counseling. The priest was soon sent for sexual-deviancy treatment and was put under strict oversight, but police were never called.
Over the next decade, the priest, the Rev. James Poole, would be accused of raping or molesting several girls. The Jesuits have paid about $1.6 million to settle two lawsuits and apologized for Poole's actions. And more civil lawsuits are pending.
What Poole told his superior, the Rev. Stephen Sundborg, and what Sundborg did or did not do with the information has taken on a larger significance for Jesuits nationwide.
SCRANTON (PA)
The Citizens Voice
By Stacy Brown, Staff Writer 12/15/2005
Attorneys for a retired Navy officer filed suit Tuesday against the Diocese of Scranton over a decades-old priest sex-abuse claim, saying a federal law created for soldiers supersedes any statute of limitation.
David Irvin, 41, of Georgetown, Ky., said he was abused over a number years beginning when he was 6 years old by the late Rev. Robert Caparelli of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Old Forge. The alleged abuse took place in the Lakeville home of Caparelli's parents, who were neighbors of Irvin, according to the lawsuit.
Irvin said he waited so long to file the suit out of fear of embarrassment for himself and for his family.
NEW YORK
Reuters
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A Catholic priest in New York state was sentenced on Wednesday to 15 months in prison after pleading guilty to possessing child pornography.
The case was the latest in a series of scandals for the Roman Catholic Church in the United States, which has been severely damaged by revelations about pedophile priests.
The U.S. Attorney in Buffalo, New York, said in a statement the case came to light after Michael Volino, 42, contacted an information technology help line for the Diocese of Rochester in January 2005 to report problems with his computer.
"As the IT specialist began his exam, he noticed what appeared to be child pornography in the temporary Internet files of the computer," the statement said.
The technician reported the find to diocese officials, who called police.
IRELAND
Irish Voice
By Mairead Carey
The former Bishop of Galway Dr. Eamon Casey has told his colleagues that he is innocent of charges of child abuse which forced him out of the priesthood in England.
The disgraced bishop was forced to step down from ministry after allegations surfaced that he had abused a young girl more than 30 years ago in Ireland.
It has since emerged that the woman, who is now living in Britain, has made similar unproven allegations against others in the past.
This week Casey, who fled Ireland in the 1990s after it was revealed that he had fathered a child with American divorcee Annie Murphy, told friends he would prove his innocence.
ROCHESTER (NY)
WHAM
(Rochester, NY) 12/14/05 -- On Wednesday, US District Judge David Larimer sentenced the Rev. Michael Volino to 15 months in federal prison to be followed by 10 years of supervision.
The judge also prohibited Volino from working with children.
Volino has 60 days to turn himself in; he is allowed to spend the holidays with his family.
In May, Volino pleaded guilty to one count of possessing child pornography.
Federal prosecutors said he had more than 600 digital images of children engaging in sexual intercourse. They had recommended that he spend four to five years in prison. He could have been sentenced to a maximum of 10 years and remain under supervision for life.
ROCHESTER (NY)
Democrat & Chronicle
Greg Livadas
Staff writer
(December 14, 2005) — Father Michael Volino was sentenced today to 15 months in federal prison and 10 years supervised release, in connection with child pornography charges.
U.S. District Judge David Larimer also prohibited the Catholic priest from ministering to children or working with school programs.
"I think Father Volino had more than an idle curiosity. It was extreme," Larimer said.
Defense lawyer John Parrinello had asked for a sentence which did not include jail time. He argued that there had never been an allegation of molestation or inappropriate physical contact.
He also had asked that community service be allowed for the priest.
"We have a very dedicated, faithful treasure, in terms of the Catholic Church," Parrinello said.
RIVERSIDE (IA)
Quad-City Times
By Dustin Lemmon
RIVERSIDE, Iowa — While about 80 priests gathered Tuesday inside St. Mary’s Church to hear presentations regarding sexual abuse of minors, victims and their advocates lined up outside to voice their frustration with the Catholic Diocese of Davenport and ask that they be involved.
The victims and their supporters, eight in all, were at the church, hoping to hand-deliver letters to each of the priests, who were attending the presentations that included discussions with several mental health experts. The diocese called the event “A pastoral response to sexual abuse in our community.”
Members of the group carrying the letters also said they want the diocese to release the names of all those who have committed abuse and to let victims help in the decision-making process for dealing with abuse cases.
Shortly after noon, three representatives of the diocese, including Alicia Owens, victims assistance coordinator, came outside and accepted the letters on behalf of the priests.
LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times
By Andrew Blankstein, Times Staff Writer
Eight men may testify that Michael Edwin Wempe molested them in the upcoming criminal trial of the former Roman Catholic priest, a judge ruled today.
Wempe is accused of sexually abusing a boy while he was chaplain at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. He was assigned there by Cardinal Roger M. Mahony after Wempe underwent therapy following allegations that he sexually abused other children.
Prosecutors have called Wempe a "master" child molester, and Mahony's supervision of his case has been watched closely.
Wempe admits molesting 13 boys when he was a Roman Catholic priest but denies the crime for which he faces trial.
This morning, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Curtis Rappe ruled that eight men who allege that Wempe molested them may testify at the trial.
RIVERSIDE (IA)
The Gazette
By Frank Gluck The Gazette
RIVERSIDE — A photo of Mike Rocca’s sexual abuser, a priest and close family friend, hung for years on a wall in his boyhood home in Iowa City.
Rocca, now 66 and living in Tipton, hated that picture. But he couldn’t bring himself to tell anyone a b o u t t h e abuse 57 years ago until after his mother, a deeply religious woman, died two years ago.
‘‘It would have killed my mother,’’ he said.
Though the priest is now dead, his identity and those of other accused abusers in the Diocese of Davenport should be known, said Rocca, who joined a small group of abuse victims and their supporters Tuesday outside St. Mary’s Church in Riverside.
Inside, an estimated 90 diocese priests were attending a session on sexual abuse.
The group, which was denied admission to the meeting, is demanding the diocese release the names of all ‘‘credibly accused’’ sexual abusers in its ranks, including those who are dead. They also want to take part in future such sex-abuse educational sessions.
‘‘In order to have a meaningful conversation about sex abuse in the church, it’s important to include the victims,’’ said Ann Green of De Witt, a member of Catholics for Spiritual Healing of Grand Mound.
IRELAND
One in Four
A RETIRED Department of Education school inspector told the High Court yesterday he had received a short letter from a parish priest concerning a Franciscan Brother who was accused of interfering with a number of girls at a primaryAbuse Tracker School in Galway.
He was giving evidence in a case in which a man in his early 40s is suing the Franciscan Order and the State for damages arising from the alleged sexual abuse at the school which he claims occurred about 250 times between 1969 and 1972.
The allegations of abuse are being made against former Franciscan Brother John Hannon (65) who was released from prison on October last after serving a 10-year sentence on indecent assault charges in relation to other children.
IRELAND
One in Four
The former Bishop of Galway Dr Éamon Casey is confident there is no foundation to the child abuse allegation recently made against him, according to the Bishop of Killaloe, Dr Willie Walsh.
Dr Walsh said yesterday that Dr Casey phoned him on Thursday to thank him for comments he made earlier this week on the allegation made against the former bishop.
In Dublin last Monday, Dr Walsh said the allegation seemed to be without any reasonable foundation, and that expecting Dr Casey to stand down on the basis of such an allegation was contrary to natural justice.
Speaking yesterday on Clare FM's Morning Focus programme, Dr Walsh said he received a phone-call from "Bishop Eamon" on Thursday.
IRELAND
One in Four
The Taoiseach and Tánaiste have been urged to instruct the Residential Institutions Redress Board to extend its deadline for receipt of applications for compensation.
The board placed advertisements last month saying it would not accept applications after Thursday next, December 15th.
However, Christine Buckley of the Aislinn group claimed yesterday that the deadline had not been sufficiently advertised.
She called for a three-month extension of the deadline and an immediate campaign, using TV, radio, and outdoor advertising, to ensure no survivor missed out. "Under section 8(2) of the Act that established it, the board may at its discretion extend the time period for the making of an application, and we are calling on them to do so," she said.
IRELAND
One in Four
One of the notable and welcome outcomes of the Ferns Inquiry has been the positive impact the process has had upon many of those who chose to give evidence to it. In these days of tribunal and inquiry fatigue, where inquiries seem to last forever and achieve little it has been encouraging to be part of an investigation that not only reported with objectivity, integrity and truth, but which also changed lives for the better. If those voices who for so many years told us that the issues investigated by the Ferns Inquiry were “all in the past” and that we should all “get on with our lives and get over it” were ever to be finally silenced then surely this report demands that silence.
The Ferns Report will now lead to much improved child protection. It will result in changes to the law of this republican democracy that will help to ensure that what happened here can never happen again. It will result in better protection for our children, and our children’s children. This investigation and the courage of those who came forward to give evidence to it speak loudly and tell us that there is extraordinary merit in responding to such past hurts in ways that reshape all of our futures.
LEESBURG (VA)
Loudon Times-Mirror
By Jana Renn
12/13/2005
The former pastor of St. John the Apostle Catholic Church in Leesburg will not go to jail after pleading no contest to one felony count of attempting to possess child pornography.
Loudoun County Circuit Court Judge Herman Whisenant Jr. on Monday sentenced the Rev. Robert Brooks, 73, to three years in jail but suspended the sentence in favor of two years probation.
Whisenant is also requiring Brooks to complete a sexual offender treatment program.
During the hearing, three people who have known Brooks for at least 15 years described him as an honest, caring and generous friend.
Brooks was indicted in February on a felony count of possession of child pornography. Brooks came under investigation in September 2003 when the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it found his name registered on a child pornography Web site.
FORT WORTH (TX)
Centre Daily
By BEN TINSLEYSTAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER
FORT WORTH — A man who is the pastor and principal of a Haltom City Baptist church and school was sentenced Tuesday to two years in prison and 10 years’ probation for sexually molesting a young boy over a period of five years. Jay Preston Connell of Landmark Baptist Church and Landmark Christian Academy received two-year sentences for each of three counts of indecency with a child by contact. The sentences will run concurrently.
Additionally, he was sentenced to 10 years’ probation on a count of indecent exposure to a child, Tarrant County Assistant District Attorney Kim D’Avignon said. The probation term will begin immediately.
Connell, 53, knew his victim since the boy was 7 years old, prosecutors said. Connell mentored him after the boy’s father died several years ago. The boy, who is now 16, last attended Connell’s school in April 2004.
When Connell gets out of prison, he will have to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life, D’Avignon said.
WICHITA (KS)
KSN
by Chanda Brown
KSN News
WICHITA, Kansas, Dec 07, 2005 -- A Wichita woman is coming forward claiming a Catholic priest assaulted her but the church reports that the relationship was consensual.
Reports of Catholic priests abusing children have been widespread in recent years but this alleged victim claims clergy victimize four times more adults then children and she’s speaking out for the other victims.
Peggy Warren claims she was sexually assaulted twice last summer by Father Nicholas Voelker.
"After the first assault, Voelker begged for my forgiveness and swore it would never happen again. I made the mistake of believing my priest," said Warren.
At the time, Voelker was a priest at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parish. Since that time, he has been moved to St. Louis parish of Waterloo and is now at St. Rose of Lima parish in Council Grove.
Bishop Michael Jackels sees a different story.
"This was not a case of clergy sexual abuse rather it was a relationship between priest and an adult woman which was both inappropriate and sinful, but nevertheless consensual."
ELLWOOD CITY (PA)
Beaver County Times
By: Robin Russo, Times Staff
12/14/2005
ELLWOOD CITY - The death of an Ellwood City priest under investigation for accusations of impropriety has left many parishioners shocked and hurt - and also with unanswered questions about the allegations.
The Rev. Mauro J. Cautela, 57, died Saturday afternoon in Ohio Valley General Hospital from a heart attack. Cautela had been the pastor at Holy Redeemer Catholic Church since 1992, but was placed on administrative leave in August after the allegations.
The Rev. John G. Oesterle, who has been serving as the parish pastor since September, said Cautela had been under investigation for allegations of financial and sexual misconduct. Oesterle said while he did not know Cautela well, the former pastor seemed outgoing, involved in the community and well-liked by parishioners.
"I think people are mostly in disbelief and shock," Oesterle said.
Oesterle said he thought most parishioners had "gotten over" the allegations, although the investigation saddened many. Oesterle said while the diocese was handling the financial allegations, the investigation of sexual misconduct was turned over to state police and the Lawrence County district attorney's office. Oesterle said the parish had not been informed of any conclusions in either investigation.
ELLWOOD CITY (PA)
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
By Jason Cato
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
The former pastor of Holy Redeemer Parish in Ellwood City, who resigned earlier this year under "serious allegations of impropriety," has died.
The Rev. Mauro Cautela, 57, collapsed Saturday while Christmas shopping with his mother and was taken to Ohio Valley General Hospital in Kennedy, where he died of an apparent heart attack, said the Rev. Ronald Lengwin, spokesman for the Catholic Diocese of Pittsburgh.
Bishop Donald W. Wuerl will preside over a 10 a.m. Mass Thursday at St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Coraopolis, Cautela's home parish.
In August, Cautela was placed on administrative leave, but Lengwin would not elaborate, except to say it was related to "improprieties with his role as pastor."
ARLINGTON (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
ARLINGTON -- An elder at the church where an Arlington minister stands accused of sexually assaulting several congregants pleaded no contest to aggravated perjury Monday in connection with the minister's case. Lisa J. Mikals received a three-year sentence, which was deferred, prosecutor Sean Colston said. Mikals was accused of lying to a grand jury investigating Bishop Terry Hornbuckle, who is in the Tarrant County Jail awaiting trial on six charges of sexual assault, a charge of tampering with a witness, a charge of retaliation against a witness and a drug possession charge. Hornbuckle is the founder of Agape Christian Fellowship on Mayfield Road.
SALT LAKE CITY (UT)
Arizona Star
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 12.14.2005
SALT LAKE CITY — A woman who claims she was forced as a young teenager to marry a much older man to fulfill her duties as a member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is now suing church leader Warren Jeffs, accusing him of arranging the union.
The civil lawsuit was filed Tuesday in Cedar City's 5th District Court, Court Executive Rick Davis said. The case will be heard by Judge Michael Westfall but has not been scheduled for a hearing. The lawsuit names Jeffs and the FLDS church corporation as defendants, asks for a jury trial and unspecified monetary damages for the woman, who in court papers is identified only as "M.J."
"The nonconsensual spiritual marriage, the required sexual relations, and M.J.'s resulting pregnancies have been physically and emotionally devastating to M.J.," court documents state.
The lawsuit contends that Jeffs performed the marriage ceremony without her consent and then commanded her and her new husband to "multiply and replenish the Earth." It also says Jeffs conspired to commit battery and sexual abuse on a child because M.J. was too young to be legally married.
NEW JERSEY
Star-Ledger
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
BY JEFF DIAMANT
Star-Ledger Staff
A Catholic priest sued the Newark archdiocese for $5 million yesterday, contending he was removed from his position as a school director in 2003 because he publicly criticized Catholic bishops for cover- ups related to the clergy sex scandal.
The federal lawsuit by the Rev. Robert Hoatson, which was filed in Manhattan, also named as defendants Newark Archbishop John J. Myers, Cardinal Edward Egan of New York, Bishop Howard Hubbard of Albany, the New York and Albany dioceses and four men from Hoatson's former religious order who he says molested him decades ago.
Hoatson, 54, still an archdiocese priest in good standing, has been a counselor for Catholic Charities since 2004, though he spends much of his time working with people who had accused priests of molesting them.
TOLEDO (OH)
Toledo Blade
By DAVID YONKE
BLADE RELIGION EDITOR
A victims' advocacy group yesterday urged Bishop Leonard Blair of Toledo to testify before an Ohio House panel on Thursday about his opposition to a bill that would extend the deadline for victims of sexual abuse to sue their perpetrators.
Claudia Vercellotti and Barbara Blaine, leaders of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, delivered a letter to the Toledo diocese headquarters yesterday saying that since Bishop Blair has lobbied privately against Senate Bill 17, he should be willing to "face the legislators and answer questions" publicly about the diocese's handling of clerical sexual abuse cases.
Bishop Blair was in Chicago yesterday on an apostolic visit to a seminary and could not be reached for comment, the diocese said. SNAP's letter was accepted by his executive assistant, Terrie Albert.
NEW YORK
NorthJersey.com
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
By JOHN CHADWICK
STAFF WRITER
A priest sued the Newark Archdiocese and other Catholic agencies Tuesday, accusing them of doing nothing to stop clergy abuse and retaliating against him for helping victims.
The suit, filed by the Rev. Robert Hoatson in U.S. District Court, Manhattan, also alleges that three of the region's top Catholic clerics, including Newark Archbishop John J. Myers, are active homosexuals. The other two named in the suit are Cardinal Edward Egan of the New York Archdiocese and Bishop Howard Hubbard of the Albany Diocese.
Hoatson also said Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, a former Newark archbishop who now runs the Archdiocese of Washington, is gay, although McCarrick is not named as a defendant.
The suit alleges that Hoatson has "personal knowledge" of the clerics' sexual behavior, but provides no evidence to back the claim. Hoatson's lawyer, John A. Aretakis, said the purpose wasn't to condemn homosexuality but to show that the bishops are morally compromised and can't discipline sexual offenders among their subordinates.
ANCHORAGE (AK)
KTUU
Tuesday, December 13, 2005 - by Megan Baldino
Anchorage, Alaska - Another man has come forward accusing a former Anchorage priest of sexual abuse.
According to an amended complaint filed in Anchorage court yesterday, Joseph Doe V claims that Rev. Francis Murphy sexually abused him in 1976, when he was 12. According to the suit, Murphy rubbed Joseph Doe V’s body with Vaseline and then sexually abused him at St. Patrick's Church rectory.
Some of the other men listed in the complaint say Murphy did the same to them as early as 1964 and as recently as 1981. Each of them are seeking damages for at least $100,000.
RIVERSIDE (IA)
KWWL
More than 80 eastern Iowa priests spent the day learning how to deal with sexual abuse.
Church abuse victims and supporters stood outside St. Mary's Church in Riverside protesting a decision by the Davenport Diocese banning them from the conference. They were told there wasn't time on the agenda.
So, the group wrote a letter to the Diocese expressing concern that victims couldn't play a role. Abuse victim Steve Theisen says, "We're having a bunch of non-victims telling us victims what's good for us...how we should heal. That's without the victims having any input."
SCRANTON (PA)
WYOU
We now know more about the man who says he was sexually abused by an Old Forge priest when he was six. David Irvin say was an altar boy from Lakeville in Wayne County when the alleged abuse took place. That was in 1969.
His Florida attorney filed a civil lawsuit today against the Diocese of Scranton.
Irvin says that he was molested over a period of several years by Father Robert Caparelli at the Priest`s parent`s home.
So the question is why did Irvin wait to come forward? His lawyer says he was in the military and did not want to hurt his career.
But his lawyer contends that even though 35 years have passed, the Dioceses should still be held responsible for a crime that could have been prevented.
"Then Monsignor Timlin, who became Bishop Timlin, knew about father Caparelli`s proclivity to engage in sexual conduct with children, concealed it, and allowed this to go on. Bishop Timlin knew about his before Mr. Irvin was molested in 1969," said Attorney Joseph H. Saunders.
GERMANTOWN (PA)
Gazette
by Melissa A. Chadwick and Tammy Murphy
Staff Writers
Several new possible victims and witnesses have been interviewed by police who are expanding their investigation into allegations of sexual abuse against a former Germantown priest.
Lt. Eric Burnett, spokesman for Montgomery County police, said detectives have received more information in recent weeks regarding allegations against the Rev. Aaron Joseph Cote, 54, a former associate pastor and youth minister at Mother Seton Parish in Germantown.
‘‘Based on the information they’ve obtained, they’re interviewing other witnesses and other possible victims,” Burnett told The Gazette Tuesday.
SEATTLE (WA)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
By CLAUDIA ROWE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
Before the Rev. Stephen Sundborg became president of Seattle University, he held annual, private meetings with another Jesuit priest who has since confessed to repeatedly molesting a 12-year-old, a 10-year-old and two adult women. Sundborg, however, never reported these crimes.
As Provincial of the Northwest Jesuits from 1990 to 1996, the distinguished, nationally known academic had at least 10 conversations with Alaska priest James Poole about improper sexual acts, but he has maintained that these discussions were privileged and, therefore, secret.
John Manly, a California lawyer who has filed several cases against Poole, dismissed such reasoning as little more than an excuse for criminal cover-up.
"If a priest, while you were provincial, manifested to you that he had raped a 7- or 8-year-old little girl on the day of her first communion, he chopped her head off after the rape, buried her body, had sex with her body after he chopped her head off and was hiding it, and you knew that the parents and the police were looking for that child, would you alert authorities?" he asked Sundborg during a deposition in October.
No, the university president replied. Everything said in his annual "accounts of conscience" with Poole -- and hundreds of other priests -- remains secret, no matter how heinous.
SCRANTON (PA)
Renew America
Matt C. Abbott
December 14, 2005
The following is the text of a lawsuit against Bishop Joseph Martino of the Catholic Diocese of Scranton, Pa.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Morning Call
By Maryclaire Dale
The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA | -- A Navy retiree sued a Roman Catholic diocese Tuesday over a decades-old priest sex-abuse claim, saying his years of military service stopped the clock on the statute of limitations.
David Irvin, 41, of Georgetown, Ky., said he was abused for four years starting in 1969 -- when he was 6 -- by the late Rev. Robert Caparelli of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Old Forge, in northeastern Pennsylvania.
The abuse took place at the home of Caparelli's parents, who lived near Irvin's family, the suit alleges.
Caparelli died in about 1994 in prison, where he was serving a two- to five-year sentence for sexually abusing a teenage altar boy.
Irvin alleges that Diocese of Scranton received complaints as early as 1968 that Caparelli had been abusing altar boys, but nonetheless transferred him from parish to parish until 1991.
"This conspiracy was carried out in part to maintain or increase charitable contributions and tuition payments and/or avoid public scandal in the church," charged the suit, filed in federal court in Scranton by lawyer Joseph H. Saunders of Pinellas Park, Fla.
NEW JERSEY
Daily Record
Victims' advocates in the gallery of the Statehouse in Trenton had been waiting more than a year for this vote. They applauded when it was over and they had a victory. The state's charitable immunity law appears to be on its way out, at least when it comes to allegations of negligence in child sexual abuse cases.
Some lobbyists were saying this could bankrupt the Catholic Church and other charities. The bill's sponsors were pointing out that New Jersey is just one of three states that still have a charitable immunity law. They were saying charities somehow exist in the other 47 states. They were saying their bill asked for a small exception to the state's law protecting charities.
It does not open up charities to lawsuits by people falling on ice, for example. This is about allowing civil suits involving the most serious of crimes.
So why all the fuss?
The bill's sponsors, state Sen. Joseph Vitale and Assemblyman Neil Cohen, were saying that lobbying against their proposal was going on Monday, as the Assembly prepared to vote more than a year after the state Senate passed a similar bill. They were saying church officials had been making calls for weeks, that parish priests had been talking to parishioners who were Assembly members. Then there was a late e-mail from the state Bar Association to all members of the Assembly.
ALABAMA
Mobile Register
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
By ANDY NETZEL
Staff Reporter
Claims that a Roman Catholic priest sexually abused one or more teenage boys circulated in Bayou La Batre and Monroeville for at least three years before the Archdiocese of Mobile launched an investigation this month, a priest who served in both of those cities said Tuesday.
An official from the archdiocese said Tuesday that the church's central office had received no complaints against the Rev. Timothy Wayne Evans until Dec. 2.
The archdiocese turned over an allegation of sexual and substance abuse against Evans to the Mobile County district attorney last week. Evans, 39, was placed on administrative leave and is not performing priestly duties at St. Margaret's in Bayou La Batre, where he was pastor, or elsewhere. No criminal charges have been filed against Evans.
SCRANTON (PA)
Times Leader
By MARK GUYDISHmguydish@leader.net
SCRANTON – The accused priest was convicted more than a decade ago and is dead. The Diocese of Scranton has had three bishops since the alleged sex abuse occurred. The statute of limitations has expired. The victim moved to Kentucky.
None of which stopped David Irvin, now in his 40s, from filing a federal lawsuit Tuesday contending he was abused at age 6 by the Rev. Robert Caparelli, and that the diocese caused it through a deliberate pattern of “fraudulent representations, concealing criminal activity, obstructing justice” and “evading” liability.
“Mr. Irvin wants to know how this could happen in his church,” attorney Joseph Saunders said during a press conference held Tuesday morning on the steps of the federal courthouse.
The 31-page suit claims Caparelli repeatedly abused Irvin for several years when he lived in Lakeville and attended St. Mary’s Church. The alleged abuse started in 1969. Caparelli was convicted on multiple counts of sexual abuse of minors in the early 1990s. He died in prison in 1994.
WORCESTER (MA)
Telegram & Gazette
By Kathleen A. Shaw TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
kshaw@telegram.com
WORCESTER— David Clohessy, national director of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, said yesterday the audit in the Catholic Diocese of Worcester and those done across the country are public relations maneuvers to convince the public the bishops have reformed in the wake of the clergy sexual abuse scandal.
“No one should be lulled into complacency by this ridiculous process. Bishops draw up the rules, decide who plays, hire the umpires and declare themselves winning. It’s a total sham,” he said.
Mr. Clohessy said the self-audits, one of which was done this year in Worcester, “are one more shrewd PR stunt by bishops to try and convince the public and the parishioners they’ve reformed when, in fact, they have not.”
The Worcester Diocese announced late last week that the diocese for a third year was found to be compliant with provisions of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People adopted by the American bishops in 2002 in response to the clergy abuse scandal. The diocese was allowed to do a self-audit this year because the diocese was compliant for the previous two years.
Other victims of clergy abuse in the Worcester diocese reacted yesterday to the audit and said things were not as rosy as some might have said.
“The impression that I’m getting is that the bishop is still making statements that would make an uninformed reader think that he is sitting down and writing all of us poor victims a letter from the depths of his heart to right this terrible wrong,” said Dave A. Lewcon of Uxbridge, who settled a lawsuit with the diocese that alleged he was sexually abused as a minor by the Rev. Thomas H. Teczar.
The diocese noted that Bishop Robert J. McManus last spring wrote to all “known victims.”
“Obviously this is bogus, but we all know that,” Mr. Lewcon said. He said he checked with victims who had received the letters and he was told “that it wasn’t much more than a form letter,” he said. Mr. Lewcon said he never received a letter from the bishop.
Mr. Lewcon questioned the auditing company, The Gavin Group of Boston, and exactly what it was auditing. The diocese doing its own evaluation “is like me giving myself my own annual job review. Why wouldn’t I give myself a raise?” he said.
Chad Boisvert, who now lives in the Boston area, received services from the diocese after alleging abuse by the Rev. Jean-Paul Gagnon as an adult pre-seminarian. He said he never received a letter from the bishop.
Paul Guries of Auburn, who settled a lawsuit with the diocese alleging sexual abuse by the Rev. Gerard L. Branconnier, said he did not receive a letter from the bishop “and I am well-known to the diocese.”
Mr. Guries, a former seminarian who studied for the priesthood for the Worcester Diocese, said he was invited to meet with the late Bishop Timothy H. Harrington at his residence during the 1990s. The bishop had a list of names of active priests in the diocese and Mr. Guries was asked if he knew of anything negative about them. The bishop closed by saying some of the priests probably would be promoted in coming weeks.
Bryan Smith of Hubbardston, an early Worcester SNAP leader, said he has received assistance through the Office for Healing and Prevention. “I feel that if the new bishop really wanted to reach out to survivors, he could have used a more personal letter to survivors, and also he should have left out his quotes of Scripture. I threw my letter away as soon as I saw Scripture quoted, as I felt like it was an insult. I don’t believe in any of that hocus-pocus,” he said.
He said that Frances Nugent, the victim service coordinator for the diocese, appears to be sincere, but he believes her “hands are tied” sometimes because she works for the diocese.
Mr. Smith never filed a lawsuit, but received some help from the diocese after alleging sexual abuse as a minor by the late Rev. Donald J. Rebokus at Holy Name High School.
The diocese has high praise for Mrs. Nugent and Sister Paula Kelleher, who co-directs the office with Mrs. Nugent. The annual audits are conducted of every diocese throughout the country.
National
By Joan Chittister, OSB
The church has endeavored more than once, however poorly, to solve the problem of sexual abuse of minors by priests. And now it's trying again.
But maybe a little history is in order.
First, in the era before pedophilia was even a word, let alone a syndrome, bishops moved pedophile priests away from what was then called "an occasion of sin" -- a single circumstance which, with prayer and penance, could be curbed.
Only later did it become public that bishops were doing it time after time. Worse, most simply failed to launch any kind of credible investigation. More ignored the victims entirely. The goal was simply to get the man out of town happen what may to the children and families involved, in the first parish -- or in the second.
NASHVILLE (TN)
News Channel 5
The lawsuit was between the Roman Catholic Diocese of Nashville and two men who said they were molested by a former priest.
The case involved former Nashville priest Ed McKeown. Right now, he's serving a 25 year prison sentence for raping and molesting one of the men.
The abuse happened after McKeown left the diocese. But the two men filed suit, saying the diocese knew the priest was a sexual predator, and didn't warn the community.
ARLINGTON (VA)
Catholic Herald
Special to the Herald
(From the issue of 12/15/05)
The Diocese of Arlington recently received a letter containing allegations of two incidents of sexual misconduct, committed 30 years ago, involving Father Robert C. Brooks, who was removed from active ministry more than a year ago. In keeping with diocesan child protection policy, civil law enforcement authorities were advised of the allegations regarding Father Brooks, and the diocese will cooperate fully with any investigation by those authorities. The diocese also will conduct its own investigation of the allegations, as required by the policy. As this investigation is in its preliminary stages, the diocese has not made any final determination as to the merit of the allegations.
Father Brooks, 73, was removed from active ministry in October 2004, immediately after Loudoun County officials informed the diocese of their intent to arrest Father Brooks on a charge of possession of child pornography. Father Brooks subsequently entered a no contest plea in October 2005 to a felony charge of attempted possession of child pornography. Authorities said he used a credit card to access a child pornography Web site in 2003, which attracted the attention of federal investigators.
Father Brooks was sentenced on Dec. 12 to two years probation and ordered to enroll in a sex offender treatment program for trying to access child pornography online. Judge Herman A. Whisenant Jr. sentenced Father Brooks to three years in prison, but the jail time was suspended in favor of probation after several church members spoke of Father Brooks’ years of service.
NEW YORK
MichNews
By Matt C. Abbott
MichNews.com
Dec 13, 2005
The following is the text of a press release, dated Dec. 13, 2005, from New York attorney John Aretakis regarding Father Robert Hoatson, a Catholic priest who is suing the New York and New Jersey archdioceses, the Congregation of Christian Brothers and the Albany diocese. Following that is the unedited text of the lawsuit itself. Note: The lawsuit text does contain some graphic language.
There will be a Press Conference on Wednesday, December 14, 2005 at 1:00 p.m. at NATION, a restaurant located at 12 West 45th Street in Manhattan. (Take elevator to 3rd floor, private room.)
Fr. Robert Hoatson, currently a Newark Archdiocese priest and former Christian Brother is suing the Newark and New York Archdiocese, the Albany Diocese and the Christian Brothers for 5 Million Dollars for the Church's and his employers’ retaliation and harassment due to the fact that Fr. Hoatson has been outspoken and critical of predatory priests in the church and for the sexual abuse he suffered as a seminarian, and most importantly for assisting victims of clergy sexual abuse for the last 3 years.
VATICAN CITY
The Ledger
The Associated Press
VATICAN CITY
Pope Benedict XVI named a new bishop to head the Diocese of Marquette, Mich., the Vatican said Tuesday.
The Rev. Alexander K. Sample, 45, a Montana native who was ordained in the Marquette Diocese, will replace Bishop James Henry Garland, who turned 74 on Tuesday.
Sample studied church law in a pontifical university in Rome.
Garland earlier this year apologized for harm done to two women who said that a longtime Marquette Diocese priest, who died in 2000, had abused them when they were children. Garland urged anyone with similar complaints to come forward.
PENNSYLVANIA
Beaver County Times
By: Kristen Garrett, Times Staff
12/13/2005
The Rev. Mauro J. Cautela was pronounced dead at 12:34 p.m. in Ohio Valley General Hospital, Kennedy Township, Allegheny County, according to the Allegheny County coroner's office. A spokeswoman said Cautela had heart disease and died from a heart attack.
Cautela, known to parishioners as Father Mauro, was the pastor of Holy Redeemer Church in Ellwood City. He was placed on administrative leave in August after allegations of impropriety were made against him.
The Rev. Ronald Lengwin, spokesman for the Pittsburgh Catholic Diocese, said Monday that the diocese had no statement regarding Cautela's death. Lengwin said the only information he had received was that Cautela had a heart attack while shopping with his mother.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
PennLive
12/13/2005, 11:34 a.m. ET
By MARYCLAIRE DALE
The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — A Navy retiree sued a Roman Catholic diocese Tuesday over a decades-old priest sex-abuse claim, saying his years of military service stopped the clock on the statute of limitations.
David Irvin, 41, of Kentucky, said he was abused for several years starting in 1969 — when he was 6 — by the late Rev. Robert Caparelli of St. Mary's Catholic Church in Old Forge, in northeastern Pennsylvania.
The abuse took place at the home of Caparelli's parents, who lived near Irvin's family, the suit alleges.
Caparelli was indicted on 26 counts of child sexual abuse in 1991 and was convicted of rape and other charges before dying in prison a few years later, the suit states.
Irvin alleges that the Scranton diocese received complaints as early as 1968 that Caparelli had been abusing altar boys, and proceeded to transfer him from parish to parish until 1991.
"The acts of defendant Diocese allowed pedophile predators such as Fr. Caparelli to perpetrate criminal acts of child sexual abuse upon children of its members. This is indicative of a pattern throughout many dioceses of the Roman Catholic Church that has gone on for decades throughout the United States," charged the suit, filed in federal court in Scranton by lawyer Joseph H. Saunders of Pinellas Park, Fla.
OHIO
The State Journal
Story by Jennifer Shoulders Email
A local bishop is being asked to travel to Columbus to testify in support of a bill that would protect children who have been abused by sexual predators. On Monday, two women claiming to be abused by priests when they were younger traveled to the Steubenville Diocese in hopes of meeting with Bishop Daniel Conlin. Barbara Blaine and Claudia Vercellotti are two practicing Catholics that are accusing local church leaders of covering up the sex abuse scandal that has been hovering over the church.
OHIO
Cincinnati Post
Post staff report
Members of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests have called on Ohio's bishops to testify in Columbus about a bill that would allow more filings of lawsuits against abusive priests.
In a letter delivered to Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk on Monday, SNAP members Christy Miller of West Chester and Dan Frondorf of Price Hill said they knew Pilarczyk had lobbied privately to kill the bill.
"We ask that you stop using parishioners' donations to block the child sex abuse reforms that will protect Ohio's innocent children who may be at risk of abuse right now," they wrote.
If not, Pilarczyk should face the legislators and answer questions about how the archdiocese has handled cases of priest sexual abuse, the letter says.
Dan Andriacco, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, said Monday that Pilarczyk wasn't in his office and hadn't read the letter.
FORT WORTH (TX)
Star-Telegram
By Ben Tinsley
Star-Telegram Staff Writer
FORT WORTH - The pastor and principal of a Haltom City Baptist church and school was convicted Monday of sexually molesting a boy he had mentored for years.
A Tarrant County jury deliberated for about five hours before convicting Jay Preston Connell of Landmark Baptist Church and Landmark Christian Academy of three counts of indecency with a child by contact and one count of indecent exposure to a child.
Connell's sentencing hearing begins at 9 a.m. today.
The boy Connell was convicted of molesting is now 16 and was molested for at least five years, prosecutor Steve Jumes said. Connell started mentoring the boy after the boy's father died several years ago. The boy last attended Connell's school in April 2004, Jumes said.
TRENTON (NJ)
The Times
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
By KRYSTAL KNAPP
Staff Writer
TRENTON - A bill that allows victims of childhood sex abuse to sue churches, schools and other nonprofit organizations for employees' misconduct has reached the governor's desk after stalling in the state Assembly for 18 months.
The bill passed 63-5 yesterday, with nine abstentions, after more than an hour of heated debate.
The state Senate approved a similar bill in May 2004.
The bill would change the state law that shields charities from civil liability by ending special protections for nonprofit groups in cases of child sex abuse by staff members.
Sponsors of the bill said the measure is likely to become law because acting Gov. Richard J. Codey already voted for it as state Senate president.
New Jersey would become the 48th state to allow victims of childhood sex abuse to sue nonprofit groups for the actions of their staff. The only other states that give charities total protection from civil lawsuits are Alabama and Tennessee.
NASHVILLE (TN)
Tennessean
By SHEILA BURKE
Staff Writer
Two young men who claimed they were molested by a former Catholic priest when they were children have settled their lawsuit with the Diocese of Nashville, avoiding a trial set to begin in March.
The settlement agreement brings an end to six years of bitter litigation that went all the way to the Tennessee Supreme Court.
It was the only sex abuse lawsuit involving the Catholic church in Middle Tennessee, said Rick Musacchio, a spokesman for the diocese.
The amount paid to the pair, known in court documents only as John Doe 1 and John Doe 2, will not be revealed to the public. Both men are now about age 25, a lawyer for them said.
The case was unusual because the man accused of molesting the two, former Nashville priest Ed McKeown, had been forced to leave the priesthood years before the men say they were abused. McKeown is serving a 25-year prison sentence for raping and molesting one of the plaintiffs.
TRENTON (NJ)
Gloucester County Times
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
By Terrence Dopp
gcnews@sjnewsco.com
TRENTON -- The state Assembly voted overwhelmingly Monday to strike down portions of New Jersey's "Charitable Immunity Act," which has blocked victims of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests from seeking monetary awards.
The 1958 statute protects a charitable organization from lawsuits by those who benefit from its services. Under the measure passed by the lower house 63 - 5 with 10 abstentions, the act would no longer apply to charges of sexual abuse. It would be retroactive to include all past cases of abuse.
Members of the state Senate, who passed a similar measure last year, need to sign off on changes made by the Assembly before the bill goes to Acting Gov. Richard Codey for his signature.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Cincinnati Inquirer
By Dan Horn
Enquirer staff writer
A Catholic bishop will testify before Ohio lawmakers this week against a bill that would allow victims to sue the church in decades-old sexual abuse cases.
The move suggests that the Catholic Church is ramping up its opposition to the bill as an Ohio House committee prepares to decide its fate, possibly within the next few months.
Bishop Frederick Campbell of the Diocese of Columbus is expected to explain why the church opposes a provision in a child-protection bill that would allow victims to sue over abuse that occurred as long ago as 35 years.
Church officials have lobbied against the provision for months and have complained that it is unconstitutional to allow such lawsuits, which today are barred because of the statute of limitations. Abuse victims and their advocates support the bill as a way to hold abusive priests accountable.
TRENTON (NJ)
NorthJersey.com
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
By JOHN CHADWICK
STAFF WRITER
TRENTON - The Assembly, acting against the wishes of the Roman Catholic Church, overwhelmingly approved a change Monday to New Jersey's powerful and zealously protected charitable immunity law, making it easier for sexual-abuse victims to sue religious and charitable institutions.
The 63-5 vote, with nine abstentions, came after nearly an hour of emotional debate, with supporters speaking of the horrors that victims of clergy abuse had endured and opponents warning the change would cause financial distress to the church and other non-profit institutions.
"In all of my time here in the Legislature, I have never felt more strongly about any piece of legislation," said Patrick Diegnan, D-Middlesex, who voted for the bill.
Diegnan declared during the session that although he had been raised by devout Catholics, he found it "incomprehensible that [the Catholic Church] and other institutions are now seeking to hide behind a shield."
PITTSBURGH (PA)
PennLive
12/12/2005, 5:12 p.m. ET
The Associated Press
PITTSBURGH (AP) — A former assistant pastor at a suburban Pittsburgh church pleaded guilty Monday to several sex charges involving a 17-year-old girl, the Allegheny County district attorney said.
David Valencia, 49, pleaded guilty to one count each of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, indecent assault, endangering the welfare of children and corruption of minors, and three counts of unlawful contact with a minor.
After a hearing, he was sentenced to two to four years in state prison, followed by five years' probation. A county judge also ordered Valencia to be registered as a sex offender. State officials will determine whether he should be classified as a sexually violent predator.
Valencia is a former assistant pastor at Christ Church at Grove Farm in Ohio Township, about 10 miles north of Pittsburgh.
LEESBURG (VA)
WVEC
12/12/2005
By MATTHEW BARAKAT / Associated Press
A Catholic priest convicted earlier this year on a child pornography charge received no jail time Monday after the prosecutor — who was a parishoner at the priest's former church — failed to seek a jail term.
Robert Brooks, 73, who had been a priest of St. John the Apostle in Leesburg, pleaded no contest in October to a count of attempting to possess child pornography.
Authorities said they searched his computer and found more than 100 images of child pornography; prosecutors said they allowed Brooks to plead guilty to a lesser charge because they could not prove the pornographic images actually depicted minors.
PENNSYLVANIA
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
By Steve Levin, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The Rev. David Valencia pleaded guilty yesterday in Common Pleas Court to sexual assault stemming from a series of incidents in 2001 involving a high school junior he was counseling at church.
Judge Donna Jo McDaniel sentenced him to 2 to 4 years in prison and 5 years' probation. He also must register as a sex offender.
"We think that this is justice served," said the victim's father. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette does not identify victims of sexual assaults.
Formerly assistant pastor at Christ Church at Grove Farm in Ohio Township, Mr. Valencia pleaded guilty to four felony charges, including one count of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, and three counts of unlawful contact with a minor. He also pleaded guilty to indecent assault, endangering welfare of children and corruption of minors.
TRENTON (NJ)
The Press of Atlantic City
By ANGELA DELLI SANTI, Associated Press Writer
Published: Monday, December 12, 2005
Updated: Monday, December 12, 2005
TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - New Jersey would become the 48th state to allow victims of childhood sex abuse to sue churches, schools and other nonprofits for the actions of their staff, under a bill approved Monday by the state Assembly.
The bill passed 63-5, with nine abstentions, following more than an hour of sometimes heated debate. The measure had been stalled in the lower house for 18 months. A similar measure was approved in the Senate in May 2004.
The bill now goes to the governor for a signature.
NEW JERSEY
The Star-Ledger
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
BY ROBERT SCHWANEBERG
Star-Ledger Staff
Churches, private schools and other charities that negligently hire employees who sexually abuse children would retroactively lose their immunity against lawsuits under a bill that passed the Senate last night 63-5.
The bill, one of the most emotional considered this term, passed as more than a dozen victims of childhood sexual abuse and their relatives and supporters watched from the Senate gallery. They broke into applause as the running vote tally showed it would pass.
"Justice is coming for the children in New Jersey, and it is a great day," said Mark Crawford of Woodbridge, who was molested as a teenager by a parish priest. Several victims hugged Sen. Joseph Vitale (D-Middlesex) and Assemblyman Neil Cohen (D-Union), who have worked to change the law for more than five years.
TREMTON (NJ)
WCBS
(CBS) TRENTON The New Jersey State Assembly passed a bill on Monday that strips the protection non-profit organizations like the Catholic Church have from lawsuits.
More than a dozen people, including those who allege they were sexually abused by priests, gathered on the steps of the New Jersey Statehouse Monday to support the bill.
“This bill is very important I think the Catholic Church needs an incentive,” said Patricia Serrano, the mother of a man who says he was sexually abused by a priest.
Serrano says her son, Mark, was molested by a priest at St. Josephs Church in Mendham, starting at the age of 9.
“There's a hole in my heart that I did not know this was happening,” she said.
NASHVILLE (TN)
WKRN
Two victims of sexual abuse at the hands of a Nashville priest have settled multi-million dollar lawsuits with the Catholic Diocese of Nashville.
The young men each filed $35 million lawsuits in 2000, claiming they were abused by Father Edward McLeown. The diocese dismissed McKeown from the priesthood in the late 1980s when charges of his abuse came to light.
NEW JERSEY
ABC 6
By Nora Muchanic
December 12, 2005 - The first thing they wanted to tell me is we have immunity.
That was Mark Crawford's experience when he went to the Catholic Church to report he had been sexually abused by his parish priest as a child.
Since 1958, charitable groups have been protected by a law that gives blanket immunity from lawsuits, whether it's someone who's slipped on the steps at church or been sexually assaulted by a clergyman.
Mark Crawford/"Fix the Law" Director: "The sexual molestation of a child is a crime and no institution should be held to a different standard than what we expect from our secular society."
Right now New Jersey is one of only 3 states in the country, along with Alabama and Tennessee, that still has a charitable immunity law on the books.
Barbara Polesir/SNAP So. Jersey: "They're all protected this way, not only churches but the boy scouts."
Today members of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests) and other groups rallied at the statehouse to urge the assembly to do what the senate already has: change the law so victims of childhood sex abuse can sue churches, schools and other non-profits for the actions of their employees.
IOWA CITY (IA)
WHO
IOWA CITY, Iowa About 80 Roman Catholic priests from parishes all across eastern Iowa are expected to attend a conference tomorrow (Tuesday) to discuss sexual abuse by priests and revise the church's child protection policy.
Advocates and former victims of sexual abuse by priests say they are frustrated because leaders with the Davenport Diocese have rejected an offer to let victims take part in the one-day program.
Diocese spokesman David Montgomery says the conference was organized by the Davenport Diocese to give clergy tools for ministering sex abuse victims, provide training on sex abuse issues and updating the church's child protection policy. The conference is scheduled to be held at Saint Mary's Church in Riverside.
Gaylord Herald Times
In view of the turmoil caused in the Roman Catholic Church by all the scandals involving the sexual abuse or exploitation of minors (not to mention the serious divisions occasioned within the Anglican Communion with the appointment of an openly “gay” bishop in the American Episcopal Church) it is relatively easy to understand recent decision of the Vatican to reiterate its previous but largely ignored ban on accepting homosexually oriented men as candidates for the priesthood. But the policy raises some serious questions.
One is to promote the confusion of homosexuality with pedophilia. What statistics are available from criminologists would indicate that most pedophiles are heterosexual. The same is probably true of ephebophilia - the sexual molestation of adolescents. At most, according to a psychological study initiated by the Vatican, homosexual orientation can be a “contributing factor” when it comes to clerical crimes involving male adolescents. But the orientation itself is not a principal “cause” of such misbehavior. Again, criminological statistics could probably be used to show that heterosexuality is a factor in crimes (including clerical ones) against female adolescents. In either case, this “factoring” also raises the question as to what degree celibacy as a precondition for ordination is also at least a significant factor the situation.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
KYW
by KYW’s John McDevitt
There was a demonstration across from Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral in Center City causing a lot of controversy as people went to Sunday mass.
David Lynn -- dressed as a Catholic priest -- was standing across the street from the Basilica offering condoms and yelling to have safe sex with your priest as people went to the 11:00am mass:
“I'm the webmaster of free political speech.com and I'm a sex abuse survivor. And I am protesting the Catholic Church shuffling pedophiles around from place to place. And I'm also protesting the way they are trying to hide the problem under the rug, their treatment of sexual abuse survivors and the way they are bashing gay people.”
DETROIT (MI)
The Detroit News
Kim Kozlowski / The Detroit News
Some frustrated parishioners at St. Thomas a' Beckett Catholic Church are planning to halt their contribution to the Archdiocese of Detroit on coming weekends to protest the Vatican's decision that their former pastor, accused of molesting an altar boy, can no longer present himself as a priest.
Six percent of the $24,000 that is collected weekly at the Canton parish is sent to the Archdiocese of Detroit, but all of the funds will stay at the church during the Christmas collection. Organizers of the financial boycott are trying to encourage others to withhold their weekly offering and put it all in the Christmas collection.
They hope to send a message about what they believe was injustice for C. Richard Kelly, who was permanently barred from performing priestly duties or wearing clerical garb and reportedly plans to appeal the decision that was announced last week.
"I prayed and prayed over this because I knew it would have big ramifications," said Mary Albus, a parishioner who began the movement and has received support from many.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Daily News
By G.W. MILLER III
millerg@phillynews.com
Sporting a black tunic, a priest's collar and sanitary rubber gloves, David Lynn stood across the street from the Cathedral Basilica of Ss. Peter and Paul yesterday, waved condoms in the air and bellowed at people entering the church for the 11 a.m. Mass.
"Adults only!" he barked. "Get a condom! Have safe sex with your priest!"
In a blatant publicity stunt intended to draw attention to the clergy sex-abuse scandal, Lynn offered free prophylactics to parishioners and passers-by.
"Contribute a little extra for the legal defense fund," he heckled to churchgoers. "They need it."
Most people who approached the basilica ignored Lynn's rants. A handful smirked at his showy antics and biting barbs. Others frowned, and a few snapped at him.
"Did you forget to take your medication today?" asked a man who declined to give his name. "Do you need me to call the police?"
TRENTON (NJ)
philly.com
JEFFREY GOLD
Associated Press
TRENTON, N.J. - Legislation that would allow childhood victims of sexual assault to sue churches, schools and other nonprofits for the actions of their employees is scheduled for a vote Monday in the state Assembly.
The measure is opposed by the Roman Catholic church, but if passed is likely to become law, since acting Gov. Richard J. Codey already voted for it in his role in the state Senate when it passed that house in May 2004, said a sponsor, Sen. Joseph F. Vitale, D-Middlesex.
Vitale said that although a lawsuit can't remove the trauma for victims, "This will give them the justice that they all deserve, both today and in the future."
The bill would change the law that now shields charities from liability. New Jersey is one of only three states in the country where charities are immune from lawsuits. The others are Alabama and Tennessee.
LA MIRADA (CA)
San Gabriel Valley Tribune
By Mike Sprague Staff Writer
When the New Year arrives, every member of the staff at the United Methodist Church of La Mirada and every Sunday School teacher, counselor and volunteer will have undergone a background check.
It's just one of the policies instituted by the La Mirada church and all of the United Methodist churches in Southern California, Guam, Hawaii and Saipan as part of an effort to stem any sex abuse scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church from occurring in United Methodist churches.
"We'd like the community to know that if they bring their children to our Sunday School, we're doing everything we can to ensure your children are safe at our church," said Linda Tremain, a member of the La Mirada church's Safe Sanctuary Committee that wrote up its plan.
"We've never had a problem at our church, but we are protecting ourselves," Tremain said.
PENNSYLVANIA
The Morning Call
Last week, newspapers were reporting on new state legislation that would address child sex crimes. One bill, HB 2300, would open a one-year window whereby all clergy sex-abuse victims, regardless of the time of their abuse, could bring a civil suit against the church. The church would not be permitted to use the expiration of the statute of limitations as a defense. The church claims such a window would be unfair and could potentially bankrupt it.
As a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, I wholeheartedly support this pending legislation. However, it is important to address questions and concerns surrounding this proposal.
Would a one-year window resulting in hundreds of lawsuits bankrupt the church? No. Unquestionably, there would be many lawsuits. Many people were preyed upon by priests, and put in harm's way by the Catholic hierarchy. But the church's contention that it would be bankrupted is a public-relations scare tactic, aimed at gaining empathy from the masses and diverting attention away from the real issue — their culpability in innumerable child rape cases.
First, the church is self-insured and has other, multiple extensive insurance policies. Yes, the insurance companies would put up a stink, but in every other diocese across the country that has been hit by clergy abuse lawsuits, insurance companies settled with the diocese and paid a portion of the claims.
FLORIDA
Sun-Sentinel
By William Butte
Posted December 12 2005
Is the Catholic Church ready to endure a persistent pedophilia problem?
That seems the obvious question to ask in light of the Vatican's new, long-anticipated "instruction," which bans men who "practice homosexuality or present profoundly deeply-rooted homosexual tendencies or support the so-called `gay culture' " from seminaries and religious orders. The new policy allows for men whose "homosexual tendencies must be overcome at least three years," as well as accepting current gay clergy.
But what the directive fails to address are men who have a deeply rooted sexual fixation toward children.
When the church's child abuse scandal erupted in 2002, the hierarchy initially dismissed the young abuse victims as unrepentant liars. But as the scope of the scandal quickly grew, and the church's own complicity in covering it up was exposed, the episcopate, seeking a new victim to blame, embraced an old stereotype and pointed its collective finger at the church's multitude of gay priests.
WORCESTER (MA)
Telegram & Gazette
By Kathleen A. Shaw TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
kshaw@telegram.com
WORCESTER— The Catholic Diocese of Worcester for a third year has been found to be in compliance with all requirements of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People, which was adopted by the American bishops in 2002 in response to the clergy sexual abuse crisis.
The audit was done by self-reporting from the diocese and was overseen by the Gavin Group, a Boston-based company that audits every diocese in the United States. Self-reporting is allowed if the diocese was found compliant the previous two years.
“I am very gratified by the results of the report as well as by the special efforts of diocesan and parish personnel who worked so hard to achieve total compliance again this year,” Bishop Robert J. McManus said in a statement. “Conducting a diocesan audit is a prodigious undertaking and it is reassuring to see our diocese successfully complete the process satisfactorily a third time.”
The bishop credited the efforts of those responsible for coordinating the audit, including Monsignor Thomas J. Sullivan, diocesan chancellor and overall audit coordinator; Sister Paula Kelleher, vicar for religious and coordinator of safe environment training; and Frances Nugent, diocesan Victim Services coordinator. Sister Kelleher and Mrs. Nugent are co-directors of the Office for Healing and Prevention, which was set up as required by the charter.
Bishop McManus said during the past year he wrote letters to all abuse victims known to the diocese. He invited them to meet with him individually so he could listen to their stories of victimization by priests and offer his personal support, healing and guidance. He has since met individually with a number of victims, he said.
The diocese continues to host a quarterly meeting of victim assistance coordinators from the 11 dioceses in New England. George “Skip” Shea of Uxbridge, who settled a lawsuit with the diocese alleging sexual abuse starting at age 11 by the Rev. Thomas H. Teczar and later by Rev. Robert Shauris, said he has sought help from the Office for Healing and Prevention. He said Mrs. Nugent “has made herself completely accessible to me.” He added she helped have the diocese make the co-payment for his therapy.
“That was huge, as it was not part of my settlement.”
He said Mrs. Nugent has been “genuine in her care. There is no pretense. I think the best thing I can say is that there are no judgments from her. I can’t say that for every Catholic, let alone someone who works in the chancery, even when we disagree, which we do on several issues.”
Mr. Shea said he still has problems feeling “safe” in a Catholic environment, but gets “pretty close to it” during his interactions with Mrs. Nugent.
Daniel E. Dick of Worcester, victim support coordinator for Worcester Voice of the Faithful, lauded the Office for Healing efforts, but said he thought the diocese should have taken more seriously his proposal to institute a program of restorative justice. His plan called for victims and abusers to come face-to-face to share their feelings, hurt and sorrow.
“Out of this mutuality, this confrontation, could come healing for both,” he said.
The Office for Healing turned down the program and said the accused priests would never agree to participate. “I found this hard-hearted reaction both alarming and disturbing,” Mr. Dick said.
“This is unfortunate because restorative justice works in prisons, with police departments dealing with juvenile offenders, was used in South Africa with the apartheid victims and their abusers. The apparent difference is that with Catholic clergy who are accused of abuse the bishop or person in authority would not order or require them to enter the program and they would not do so of their own volition,” he said.
“It appears that to agree to such a meeting with a victim is regarded as an outright admission of guilt. Such a meeting between victim and abuser might also reflect on a bishop’s handling of the case.”
Mr. Dick said he is also concerned the diocese has not revealed where accused priests who were removed from ministry are living.
“I feel it only reasonable and responsible that the people of this diocese know where these pedophiles, alleged and convicted, are living, since they are presumably living among us and our children and have a monthly income, a car, and a great deal of freedom to come and go where and as they please,” he said.
If victims of clergy sexual abuse are to truly turn around their lives, they need the support of their entire communities, Mr. Dick said. He believes the Office for Healing is a first step toward helping people, but his experience in working with victims indicates they do best when the rest of the community also becomes supportive.
The diocese reported 44,935 adults and young people in Central Massachusetts have received the required “safe environment” training since the charter was implemented in 2002. More than 4,000 adults, most of whom are parish volunteers, have been trained since September.
Criminal offense background checks have been done on more than 11,000 diocesan clergy, religious and lay professionals and volunteers. The background checks were coordinated through the diocesan Office of Healing and Prevention.
The diocese previously reported to theAbuse Tracker Review Board, which oversees compliance with the charter, that 45 priests of this diocese were credibly accused of sexual abuse between 1950 and 2003.
WASHINGTON (DC)
The New York Times
By NEELA BANERJEE
Published: December 11, 2005
WASHINGTON, Dec. 8 - When the Rev. Augustine Tran went to Vietnamese-American parishes as a seminarian a couple of years ago, pastors and worshipers would hand him money to help him with school, though they had little of their own. When he goes to the Vietnamese enclaves of suburban Virginia, where he now works, Roman Catholics often greet him like a celebrity, his siblings said.
At a time when fewer American Catholics are expressing interest in the priesthood, Vietnamese-American men are an anomaly. They are now the second-largest minority ethnic group in seminaries, only slightly behind Hispanics, who account for a far larger percentage of the general population.
While church experts and priests say that some Catholics frown upon their sons' joining the priesthood and are even embarrassed by it in the wake of the sex abuse scandals among members of the clergy, Vietnamese Catholics continue to hold the priesthood in high regard. They say that the sex scandal marred individual clergymen but not the vocation itself.
LOS ANGELES (CA)
CTV.ca News Staff
Trailblazing comedian Richard Pryor, whose unflinching commentary on race relations and his own shortcomings transformed the entertainment industry, died after a heart attack Saturday. He was 65.
"He was my treasure," said his wife Jennifer Pryor, whom he remarried in 2001, in a telephone interview with CNN. ...
According to the biography on his official website, Pryor was raped by a teenaged neighbour at the age of six and molested by a Catholic priest during catechism.
OREGON
The Sunday Oregonian
Sunday, December 11, 2005
ASHBEL S. GREEN
Process servers have crashed celebrity parties, donned disguises and engaged in car chases -- whatever it takes to put legal papers into the hands of reluctant defendants.
But rough-and-tumble tactics won't work against the Vatican, an independent country located within the city of Rome. To sue a foreign nation, lawyers in an Oregon priest abuse case needed to spend $40,000 for a pair of Latin translators and wait more than three years to serve the proper Vatican official through the right diplomatic channels.
"I've never in 24 years of practice ever had the kind of obstruction, obfuscation, delays, difficulties, challenges and nonsense that I've encountered in trying to serve them," said Jeffrey R. Anderson, a Minneapolis attorney representing the plaintiff in the case.
But Anderson's persistence paid off. Thousands of lawsuits have been filed against Catholic dioceses and religious orders, but Anderson's suit is believed to be just one of two pending against the Vatican itself.
And Anderson's lawsuit, which involves a priest who molested a boy in Portland in the mid-1960s, is believed to be the first priest-abuse case to be successfully served against the Holy See in Rome.
Anderson, who has sued hundreds of dioceses and religious orders around the country, said he wants to hold the Vatican financially responsible.
HUDSON (WI)
Minneapolis Star-Tribune
Richard Meryhew, Randy Furst and Paul Levy
Last update: December 10, 2005 at 10:11 PM
Star Tribune staff writers
As he spoke to the congregation about the Blessed Virgin Mother, the Rev. Ryan Erickson began sobbing.
Like others at St. Patrick's Church in Hudson, Wis., Joan Richie was stunned the first time she witnessed one of Erickson's emotional outbursts.
But when his crying became a regular part of his sermons, an irritated Richie said she could no longer hold herself back. She confronted him one Sunday about four years ago in the church sacristy.
"He was like a little child, gasping for air between sobs when I asked him, 'Aren't you overdoing it a bit? Can't you quit crying?' " Richie, 79, recalled. "And he did. If he had to, he could turn it on and off.
"I never doubted his devotion to his faith. But Ryan Erickson was an actor. And his greatest role may have been as a priest."
ST. LOUIS (MO)
WAOW
ST. LOUIS - A FORMER ROMAN CATHOLIC PRIEST FROM WISCONSIN WHO PREVIOUSLY WAS CONVICTED OF A SEX CRIME INVOLVING A CHILD WAS SENTENCED FRIDAY TO NINE YEARS IN FEDERAL PRISON FOR POSSESSING CHILD PORNOGRAPHY.
DAVID MALSCH, 66, ALSO WAS FINED $12,500. HE PLEADED GUILTY IN FEBRUARY IN FEDERAL COURT IN ST. LOUIS TO ONE FELONY COUNT OF RECEIPT OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY.
MALSCH PREVIOUSLY WAS CONVICTED OF CHILD ENTICEMENT IN 1993 IN WISCONSIN, AND IN 2001 WAS SENT TO A HOME FOR TROUBLED PRIESTS IN MISSOURI. THAT'S WHERE 28 IMAGES OF CHILD PORN WERE DISCOVERED IN HIS ROOM BY FEDERAL INVESTIGATORS IN 2003.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe
By Eileen McNamara, Globe Columnist | December 11, 2005
The demonstrators outside a Catholic Charities fund-raiser honoring Mayor Thomas M. Menino the other night are not leaders of some right-wing ascendancy among the laity in the Boston Archdiocese.
They are a tiny band of antiabortion zealots, being exploited by the hierarchy in hopes of promoting a backlash against reformers outraged by the criminal conduct of predatory priests and the bishops who protected them.
These folks do not just miss the Latin Mass; they miss Cardinal Bernard Law.
Who exactly organized that hardy handful of protesters out there in the snow holding signs denouncing abortion and gay rights? They claim to be apolitical, mainstream, traditional Catholics. Judge for yourself.
OREGON
The Oregonian
Sunday, December 11, 2005
I t's now up to U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris to decide whether the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon owns the 124 parishes it encompasses. Many Oregonians, no doubt including some of the archdiocese's 400,000 parishioners, have been surprised to learn the archdiocese's ownership is in question.
Parish priests, after all, answer to the archbishop and, in most cases, either he or the archdiocese is listed on real estate deeds. And yet each parish does its own fundraising and has its own unique history. For generations of devoted parishioners, certainly, each parish is irreplaceable.
Under church law, the archdiocese argues that each parish holds its property independently. One way or the other, we don't envy Judge Perris this painful decision, which treats churches merely as real estate. Yet in filing for bankruptcy last year, that's exactly what the archdiocese sought, of course: a businesslike treatment and sorting of its assets. The judge's ruling will determine whether an estimated half-billion dollars in parish properties and investments are available if needed to pay damage suits filed by sex-abuse victims.
OMAHA (NE)
Pioneer Press
Associated Press
OMAHA, Neb. - Weeks after a judge declared that repressed memories are not reliable enough for filing claims of sexual abuse, a lawyer said he will not use the claim in a similar case against Boys Town.
Minnesota attorney Patrick Noaker said he made the move this past week, dropping the repressed memory argument in James Duffy's federal lawsuit against Girls and Boys Town, based in Omaha.
Noaker's bid to use the claim in another case was thrown out by Douglas County District Court Judge Sandra Dougherty in late November. She ruled that expert testimony claiming Todd Rivers of Omaha had repressed memories of abuse at Boys Town could not be presented at trial. Rivers' expert, Dougherty said, did not prove that such a diagnosis is scientifically valid.
Noaker, of St. Paul, Minn., said he withdrew the claim because he expected the same result from a similar hearing for Duffy's case scheduled for later this month.
TOLEDO (OH)
Toledo Blade
By MARK REITER
BLADE STAFF WRITER
An audio-taped interview that Toledo police conducted with the Rev. Gerald Robinson nearly 25 years ago in investigating the slaying of a local nun are among the records being sought by attorneys for the priest.
Father Robinson is accused of fatally stabbing Sister Margaret Ann Pahl in the chapel of Mercy Hospital near downtown Toledo. A trial is scheduled to begin April 17 in Lucas County Common Pleas Court.
Attorneys yesterday asked Judge Thomas Osowik to compel prosecutors to provide them with recordings of the police interview with Father Robinson that was made after Sister Margaret Ann's death on April 5, 1980.
The motion filed by the attorneys also asks the court to provide the affidavit for a search warrant that they believe police served in 1981 at the home of a man who was questioned in connection with the case.
MESA (AZ)
East Valley Tribune
By Lawn Griffiths, Tribune
December 8, 2005
Saying he faces "complicated trials with potentially (a) large number of witnesses," Monsignor Dale Fushek is asking for a year to prepare his defense against 10 sexual misconduct charges.
Fushek, former pastor of St. Timothy’s Catholic Community in Mesa, was arrested Nov. 21 on accusations he molested seven men and boys on church property between 1984 and 1994. He has pleaded innocent to the misdemeanor charges.
His attorney, Michael Manning, filed a letter with Justice of the Peace Samuel Goodman of the South Mesa/ Gilbert Justice Court this week spelling out the requests.
Manning asked the judge to "sever" the complaints and order separate trials involving each male accuser so that Fushek would not suffer "copycat allegations."
DENVER (CO)
Journal-Advocate
By Bruce Schuknecht Journal-Advocate staff writer
DENVER - Copies of two new lawsuits alleging child molestation against a former local church priest were revealed Friday.
The fresh complaints against the Archdiocese of Denver, filed this week in Denver District Court, seek unspecified money damages. They also name Harold R. White, a former St. Anthony's priest of Sterling, as a co-defendant. They accuse him of molesting at least 12 boys during his 33-year church career.
Similar lawsuits say he left the priesthood two years ago.
Office staff for Denver attorney Thomas Roberts, who filed the suits Monday, could not say where the former priest now resides. An Associated Press article this week mentioned White has an unlisted phone number.
The newest complaints listed John Koldeway, now of Alaska, as one plaintiff. The other names John Doe 1A of Colorado as the second plaintiff. Both men accuse the diocese of negligence in supervising White, and also fraud for allegedly hiding the boys' complaints. Their documents describe a serial abuser of young boys between 1960 and 1981.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Forever a Square Peg
Sounds like the beginning of a bad joke doesn't it? Well, according to Dmac, it's not.
A man, dressed as a priest will be distributing condoms to mass-goers at the Cathedral Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul this Sunday morning. Here's an excerpt from the press release:
"The lay-Catholic stance of 'we love our faith, but we disapprove of our bishops' actions' is untenable at best…Every time parishioners go to worship in a Catholic Church or give money, they are supporting the bishops' ability to shelter pedophiles, play legal hardball against survivors, and bash homosexuals. They need to realize this, and the sooner the better."
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Will Do
With a last name like "McQuade," it's no surprise that I'm really excited about a coming event I got a press release for today. David Lynn, the webmaster of FreePoliticalSpeech.com, is dressing as a priest and handing out condoms at the Basilica on Sunday morning.
"In addition, the grand jury's report makes clear that even priests are not always honest about their sex lives," Lynn was quoted in the press release. "People who might have sex with their priests need to understand this, and practice safe sex with their clergy -- you never know where their hands have been."
Eh, you know, there's nothing like a good publicity stunt. And there's really nothing like a good publicity stunt that will piss off a bunch of old Catholics minding their own business and going to church. (I've seen a lot of angry old Catholics in my life, and it's a fun sight.) But calling for safe priest-lay people relations? Now there's one I haven't heard before.
Oh, and kiddies: sadly, this free condom hand out is for adults only. But Lynn doesn't specify if you have to be Catholic! (Or if you have to be looking for a relationship with a priest.) So if you're a human adult and looking to get your groove on, hey, here's a chance for some free protection.
Full release after the jump.
For Immediate Release: December 8, 2005 Contact: David Lynn, Webmaster, FreePoliticalSpeech.Com Email: Webmaster@FreePoliticalSpeech.Com
Condoms To Be Distributed At Cathedral Basilica Of St. Peter And St. Paul Before High Mass
Condoms will be distributed to adult parishioners of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Peter and St. Paul in Philadelphia, PA before High Mass on December 11, 2005, it was announced today.
David Lynn, Webmaster, FreePoliticalSpeech.Com, will distribute condoms to adult parishioners at Sister Cities Park, across the street from the Cathedral. Lynn, who will be dressed as a priest, will be distributing condoms in order to spotlight the recent child abuse scandal in the Catholic Church.
WISCONSIN
Green Bay Press-Gazette
By Andy Nelesen
anelesen@greenbaypressgazette.com
A civil lawsuit against a former Catholic priest convicted of molesting a 10-year-old boy gained traction Friday when a Brown County judge cleared the way for questioning of high-ranking church officials.
But in granting the depositions, Brown County Circuit Court Judge Mark Warpinski set limits on the scope of the questions, limiting the probe to what church officials knew about David Schauer's allegations and what they knew about local church officials' response.
Schauer, now 28, was molested by Donald Buzanowski, a priest assigned to Ss. Peter and Paul Catholic School in Green Bay while Schauer was a student there in 1988. Buzanowski was convicted by a Brown County jury in July of two counts of sexual assault of a child. He was sentenced in September to 32 years in prison.
INDIANA
Fort Wayne News-Sentinel
A column by Kevin Leininger
The Vatican made worldwide news last week with its announcement of a policy designed to fight sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic Church. So why does a woman allegedly abused by a local priest more than 50 years ago insist the church didn’t go nearly far enough?
“Are they so hard-up for priests they had to do this? It’s the biggest joke going,” said Michele Bennett, 62, who claims to have been molested by the late Father William Ehrman in the rectory of New Haven’s St. John the Baptist Catholic Church. Bishop John D’Arcy, of the Fort Wayne-South Bend Diocese, called Bennett’s story “credible” after I first reported her claims in 2002.
But if Bennett believes the Vatican is right to deny ordination to gays to protect boys and young men – and she does – she also believes the policy is insufficient, for a variety of reasons.
There is, of course, the obvious: The alleged crime against Bennett was heterosexual in nature. But Bennett – now a teacher in Battle Creek, Mich. – fears the no-gays policy won’t adequately protect boys, either.
PORTLAND (OR)
Catholic Sentinel
12/09/2005 Ed Langlois
A federal bankruptcy court in Portland Tuesday heard arguments over who owns Catholic parishes in western Oregon.
Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris is expected to rule in the coming weeks on the question, which is crucial to the Archdiocese of Portland’s bankruptcy case — and could impact the debate over religious freedom in the nation.
If the court decides that the region’s 124 parishes and more than 40 Catholic schools are owned by the archdiocese, the funds available to be meted out in abuse settlements could increase from tens of millions to hundreds of millions.
In an adversary proceeding within the 17-month-old bankruptcy process, parishes and the archdiocese say Oregon and U.S. law require that churches be able to abide by their internal codes. That would mean the archdiocese cannot be forced to break Catholic canon law, which holds that parish and school assets are owned by the parishes and schools.
STOCKTON (CA)
Record
PAULA SHEIL
Record Staff Writer
Published Saturday, Dec 10, 2005
STOCKTON --The Roman Catholic Church has reaffirmed its position that homosexual behavior is sinful, and ruled that anyone with "deep-seated homosexual tendencies" will not be ordained as a priest.
The Vatican initiated an extensive study of all U.S. seminaries in 2002, when the church was faced with a staggering number of clergy sex-abuse lawsuits. Diocese from Boston to San Francisco dealt with accusations of clergy misconduct with children, many of whom were adolescent boys.
Critics of the Vatican document, approved by Pope Benedict XVI and published Nov. 29, say it targets gay priests because of the defrocked pedophile priests, some of whom spent time in prison. Not true, said Bishop Stephen Blaire, head of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Stockton.
"There is no substantiated correlation between pedophilia and homosexuality," Blaire said. "These are two different issues and need to be treated as such."
ARLINGTON (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
By MARK AGEE
STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER
ARLINGTON -- The attorney representing an Arlington minister accused of sexually assaulting congregants has asked that Judge James Wilson be removed from the case.
Mike Heiskell, who represents Bishop Terry Hornbuckle, confirmed that he had filed a motion to recuse the judge but would not say why.
"Since there is a gag order, that's all I can say," Heiskell said.
The Star-Telegram attempted to obtain a copy of the motion, but a clerk said the motion was part of the case file and subject to the gag order, which Wilson put in place earlier this year after the case received significant media attention. ...
Hornbuckle, founder and lead pastor of Agape Christian Fellowship in south Arlington, has been indicted on six charges of sexual assault, a charge of tampering with a witness, a charge of retaliation against a witness and a drug possession charge.
ROCHESTER (NY)
WHEC
12/8/05
The Diocese of Rochester has confirmed that a local priest who was accused of abusing young men in the 1970's and 1980's has died. Father Robert O'Neill was one of six priests removed from their duties by Bishop Matthew Clark in 2002.
Father O'Neill died Wednesday night. It was alleged the abuse took place when Father O'Neill took the boys to a camp in the Thousand Islands.
AUSTRALIA
The Age
By Barney Zwartz, Religion Editor
December 11, 2005
THE Catholic Church plans to use the media to get its message to a world increasingly reluctant to attend church.
The church's leadership, which has long been suspicious of the media and on the back foot over such scandals as clerical sexual abuse, plans to guide the church into "the media age". The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference will issue a pastoral document in February.
"It's a question of awareness," Perth Archbishop Barry Hickey said yesterday. "We live in the media age. Sometimes we're slow to recognise that, preferring just to communicate within the Catholic family itself when we ought to be listening to the world and responding."
LANSING (MI)
The Ledger
By DAVID EGGERT
Associated Press Writer
LANSING, Mich.
The Michigan Supreme Court has ordered a new trial for a Roman Catholic priest convicted of sexual misconduct with a boy at a Detroit rectory, ruling the priest was deprived of an impartial jury.
The Rev. Edward Olszewski, 72, was convicted in 2002 of indecent liberties with an 11-year-old boy at St. Cecilia's in Detroit. His accuser said the misconduct took place in the early 1970s.
In an order released Friday, the high court agreed with Olszewski's argument that a woman who was molested as a young child should not have been allowed on the jury. Wayne County Circuit Judge Diane Hathaway had previously ruled that the juror acted fairly and based her decision on the evidence.
Olszewski was forced to step down from his Key Largo, Fla., parish in 2002. He still lives in Florida and is serving a three-year probation term, which is scheduled to end in January.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
By Stephan Salisbury
Inquirer Staff Writer
A Common Pleas Court judge, dabbing tears from her eyes as she told of agonizing over "the right thing to do," sentenced a Roman Catholic priest yesterday to 12 years of probation in the only criminal case arising from the church sex-abuse scandal in Philadelphia. The district attorney, in response, said she was "appalled and disappointed."
The Rev. James Behan, 61, pleaded guilty in February to repeatedly sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy, a student at North Catholic High School, in the late 1970s.
Judge Pamela Dembe's courtroom, packed with Behan supporters who traveled by bus from Wilmington, N.C., home of Behan's last parish, echoed with sighs of relief. Supporters hugged each other, many saying, "Thank God it's over."
Gene Donohoe, whose younger brother, Martin, was the victim, said the sentence surprised the family.
"The judge made a decision, and we have to live with it," he said.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Daily News
By THERESA CONROY
conroyt@phillynews.com
The sins of the father were forgiven - and almost forgotten - yesterday.
The Rev. James Behan, the area's only Catholic priest convicted in the church's sex scandal, had faced up to 25 years in a state penitentiary for repeatedly abusing a North Catholic High School student for two years in the late 1970s.
He was sentenced to just 12 years' probation.
The prosecutor asked that the molesting priest be sent to prison for 11 to 22 years. The defense attorney wanted him set free to return to his duties of changing "soiled diapers" and cleaning bathrooms for elderly priests.
PENNSYLVANIA
News & Observer
Joann Loviglio, The Associated Press
A judge broke down in tears Friday as she gave probation to a priest who had a sexual relationship with a teenage student in the late 1970s. The priest was transferred to Raleigh in 1980.
"I've worried about this case for months now, and I can't pretend to any one of you that I know what the right thing to do is," Common Pleas Judge Pamela Dembe tearfully said. "Where I get stuck is I don't know how to balance one very terrible violation against the 30 years that followed."
The Rev. James J. Behan is the only priest charged in Philadelphia since the church abuse scandal broke in 2002. He has been barred from public ministry and lives in Childs, Md., where he works at a home for elderly priests.
Behan, 61, a member of the Oblates of St. Francis de Sales, performed oral sex on the teenager on multiple occasions from 1978 to 1980, when he taught religion at Northeast Catholic High School for Boys, prosecutors said.
LANSING (MI)
The Detroit News
By David Eggert / Associated Press
LANSING -- The Michigan Supreme Court has ordered a new trial for a Roman Catholic priest convicted of sexual misconduct with a boy at a Detroit rectory, ruling the priest was deprived of an impartial jury.
The Rev. Edward Olszewski, 72, was convicted in 2002 of indecent liberties with an 11-year-old boy at St. Cecilia's in Detroit. His accuser said the misconduct took place in the early 1970s.
In an order released Friday, the high court agreed with Olszewski's argument that a woman who was molested as a young child should not have been allowed on the jury. Wayne County Circuit Judge Diane Hathaway had previously ruled that the juror acted fairly and based her decision on the evidence.
Olszewski's attorney said her client was ecstatic.
"He has maintained his innocence all along," Elizabeth Jacobs said. "The Michigan Supreme Court has given him a very nice Christmas present. This really means a lot to him. He had to give up being a priest."
FORT WORTH (TX)
Star-Telegram
By DARREN BARBEE
STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER
FORT WORTH -- Four men on Friday accused leaders of the Fort Worth Roman Catholic Diocese of protecting an Arlington priest who they say sexually abused them and later keeping them in the dark about other victims, including one another.
The accusations were made in court documents that also seek to gain access to the sealed files of Monsignor James Reilly, who died in 1999, and six other priests accused of sexual misconduct with children. The four men, who are not identified in the documents, are seeking an unspecified amount of money from the church.
Three of the men reported their accusations to the diocese, and each was told that he was Reilly's only victim, according to the documents and the men's attorney. It is unclear from the suit when each man came forward to report the allegations. The fourth man said Friday that he never went to the diocese.
LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Times
From Times Staff and Wire Reports
The state Court of Appeal on Thursday gave Cardinal Roger M. Mahony at least 30 days to persuade higher courts to stall the court-ordered disclosure of internal files on two priests accused of molestation.
The court denied a request by Mahony's lawyers for more time to try to persuade the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn state court rulings demanding that the files be turned over to investigating authorities.
A Los Angeles County grand jury subpoenaed the documents three years ago.
CONCORD (NH)
Boston.com
December 9, 2005
CONCORD, N.H. --Prestigious St. Paul's School has apologized for faculty abuse of students years ago and asked any victims who have not come forward to do so now.
"To the alumni who came forward, and to any others who may have been harmed, I want to apologize on behalf of the school," interim Rector William Matthews wrote in the school newsletter and a guest newspaper column this week.
Matthews also reached out to other victims.
"These stories, as difficult as they are to tell and to hear, are necessary steps in order to help individual and institutional healing, and further to help ensure what happened does not happen again," Matthews wrote Thursday in the Concord Monitor.
The article appeared a few days after early copies of an article in Vanity Fair's January edition began circulating. The article, by St. Paul's graduate Alex Shoumatoff, says a woman attending her 25th reunion in 2000 told classmates that a popular faculty member tried to sexually assault her when she was a senior. She said she fled.
ST. LOUIS (MO)
Duluth News Tribune
JIM SALTER
Associated Press
ST. LOUIS - A former Roman Catholic priest from Wisconsin who was previously convicted of a sex crime involving a child was sentenced Friday to nine years in federal prison for possessing child pornography.
David Malsch, 66, was also fined $12,500. He pleaded guilty in February in federal court in St. Louis to one felony count of receipt of child pornography.
Malsch was previously convicted of child enticement in 1993 in Wisconsin, and in 2001 was sent to the Wounded Brothers Recon Facility, a home for troubled priests in the eastern Missouri town Robertsville. That's where 28 images of child porn were discovered in his room by federal investigators in 2003.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
By Stephan Salisbury
INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
A Common Pleas Court Judge, dabbing tears from her eyes, sentenced a Roman Catholic priest to 12 years probation yesterday in the only criminal case arising from the church sex-abuse scandal in Philadelphia.
The Rev. James Behan, 61, pleaded guilty in February to repeatedly sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy, a student at North Catholic High School in the late 1970s.
Judge Pamela Dembe's court, packed with Behan supporters who traveled by bus from Wilmington, N.C., home of Behan's last parish, echoed with sighs of relief. Supporters hugged each other, many saying, "Thank God, it's over."
Gene Donohoe, whose younger brother, Martin, was the victim, said the family was surprised at the light sentence.
PENNSYLVANIA
WCNC
12/09/2005
By JOANN LOVIGLIO / Associated Press
A judge broke down in tears Friday as she gave probation to a priest who had a sexual relationship with a student in the late 1970s.
"I've worried about this case for months now and I can't pretend to any one of you that I know what the right thing to do is," Judge Pamela Dembe tearfully said. "Where I get stuck is I don't know how to balance one very terrible violation against the 30 years that followed."
The Rev. James J. Behan is the only priest charged in Philadelphia since the church abuse scandal broke in 2002.
Behan, an Oblate priest, performed oral sex on the teenager dozens of times from 1978 to 1980 when he taught at Northeast Catholic High School for Boys, prosecutors said.
MISSOURI
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Oakville-Mehlville Journal
12/07/2005
In Kevin Madden's recent editorial, he poses the question "Is a priest guilty until proven innocent?" He then raises many questions that provide an opportunity for me to educate him and the public on the complexity of sexual abuse cases against children.
A jury of Father Graham's peers heard all of the evidence presented during his trial. Twelve jurors unanimously found Graham guilty of sodomy beyond a reasonable doubt. This was an unbiased jury with no connections to either Thomas Graham or the victim.
This same jury, after hearing during the sentencing phase of the trial that other victims have come forward with similar details of the abuse they suffered at the hands of Graham, unanimously found that Graham deserved 20 years imprisonment for committing this heinous offense.
IRELAND
Waterford News & Star
Friday, December 09, 2005
FORMER Mercy nun Nora Wall can now sue the State for damages after the Court of Criminal Appeal declared that her wrongful conviction for the rape of a 10 year-old girl at a Cappoquin child care home was a miscarriage of justice.
The 57 year-old woman’s nine-year ordeal ended last Thursday when the court made its declaration. Outlining the court’s decision, Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns said he was satisfied based on newly discovered facts in the case that a miscarriage of justice had taken place.
Key among these new facts was the admission by Patricia Phelan, a crucial witness at Ms Wall’s trial six years ago, to gardai and a nun, Sr. Mona Killeen, that she lied about seeing Ms Wall hold down a young girl while a man raped her at St. Michael’s Child Care Centre in Cappoquin.
UNITED KINGDOM
ic Coventry
Dec 8 2005
By Martin Smith
THE Roman Catholic Church has paid out more than £150,000 between three men who claim they were abused as children by former Coventry priests.
Two men - who both come from Coventry but one now lives in Birmingham - were awarded more than £20,000 each in separate out-of-court settlements after claiming they were abused by Fr James Robinson.
A third man, from Coventry, won a much larger sum in damages after claiming he was a victim of abuse by Fr Christopher Clonan, who was assistant parish priest at Christ the KIng Church in Coundon for 20 years until 1992.
The two men who claim they were Fr James Robinson's victims had been set to sue the Birmingham Archdiocese in the High Court, claiming negligence in its duty of care to them.
AUSTRALIA
ABC
A Melbourne court has been told a priest who molested 10 school students committed the most profound breach of trust imaginable.
Catholic priest Frank Klepp, 62, has pleaded guilty to 13 counts of indecent assault.
The Victorian County Court heard he molested 10 students on numerous occasions at Sunbury's Salesian College, north-west of Melbourne, in the 1970s.
The court heard all the boys were sick and confined to the boarding school's infirmary at the time.
Klepp's lawyer has told the court her client is remorseful but conceded that it is hard to imagine a more profound breach of trust.
JAPAN
Mainichi Daily News
KYOTO -- Prosecutors on Friday demanded that a court sentence a priest to 20 years in prison for more than 20 cases of raping teenage girls.
Tamotsu Kin, 62, founder of the Seishin Chuo Church in Yawata, Kyoto Prefecture, raped or attempted to rape seven girls, aged 12 to 16 years old, at his church on 22 occasions from March 2001 to September 2004, according to prosecutors.
He often told the girls that if they resisted him, they would suffer in hell in an attempt to force them to accept his attacks.
"Taking advantage of his religious status, he treated young followers as playthings. The cases mentioned in the indictment are probably only the tip of the iceberg," a prosecutor told the Kyoto District Court. "The victims suffered incurable mental anguish. He only said he didn't deny the allegations, but he hasn't stated any facts."
IRELAND
The Kerryman
A PRIEST in a mid Kerry parish has stepped aside from his ministry pending an investigation into an allegation of inappropriate sexual behaviour.
A spokesman for the Diocese of Kerry revealed this week that the Diocese has informed the gardaí and the Health Services Executive of the allegation and an investigation is currently underway.
The priest at the centre of the allegation is aged in his 60s and has stepped aside from his ministry following a complaint made in recent weeks relating to an incident that is alleged to have occurred during the 1980s.
The complaint was made directly to the diocese by a person who was adult at the time of the alleged incident.
The priest at the centre of the investigation has been in the same parish for the last number of years. The complaint relates to his time in another parish in Kerry.
AUSTRALIA
The Age
By Daniella Miletic, County Court Reporter
December 10, 2005
A CATHOLIC priest who taught at a Melbourne college in the 1970s preyed on 10 sick teenagers while they recovered in the school infirmary, a court has heard.
Frank Gerard Klep has pleaded guilty in the County Court to 13 charges of unlawful and indecent assault. He was a teacher at the Salesian order's Rupertswood College in Sunbury when he sexually abused the boys, aged between 12 and 17.
Crown prosecutor Carolyn Burnside told yesterday's plea hearing that Klep's victims were boarders and that he assaulted them while they were in the infirmary. He was then in charge of students in the infirmary.
One victim, 15, said he was fondled by Klep and that Klep gave him oral sex, then told him he would get into trouble if he told anyone. Another boy, 16, was trying to sleep when he felt his pants being pulled down. Kelp then used a sponge to clean his penis. The court heard that one 12-year-old who was in the infirmary because he had measles, remembered Klep staring at his penis, telling him he was "looking for spots".
Philadelphia Inquirer
Tom Teepen
is a columnist for Cox News Service
If you are of a mischievous mind, you could have good sport with parts of the recently leaked Vatican policy on homosexuality and the priesthood.
The policy is still officially only pending but, by common account, it apparently is settled and inevitable, along the lines of a recently leaked document.
To no one's surprise - key points had been publicly bandied about at least for months - the Roman Catholic Church will forbid ordination to all but the small number of putatively gay applicants who can convince church authorities that any homosexual occasion in their life was at least three years in the past and only a muddled, fleeting attraction and that the candidate can live a celibate life henceforth indifferent, if not outright antagonistic, to "gay culture," whatever that may be.
Together, these points build a very high bar indeed, as plainly was meant to be the case. In erecting that bar, the church effectively buys into the hoary canard - discredited in experience and in research - that links homosexuality and pedophilia.
LATHAM (NY)
North Country Gazette
LATHAM---Her "out" date is next week.
One of the most closely watched cases in the country will essentially conclude next Thursday, Dec. 15 when the former English teacher at Christian Brothers Academy who pleaded guilty to statutory rape will be released from Albany County jail after having served her sentence of six months.
Sandra "Beth" Geisel admitted to having sex in May with a 16-year-old male student at the Catholic school. She has registered as a Level I sex offender and will have to enter a residential rehab center for drugs and alcohol. She will also be on probation for 10 years.
CONNECTICUT
Insurance Journal
December 9, 2005
In a case that could have implications for New York Cardinal Edward Egan, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport asked the Connecticut Supreme Court to reconsider its ruling that newspapers can ask for documents related to its settlement of priest abuse cases.
The 3-2 ruling by the high court last month left it up to a lower court to decide whether to release the records. The diocese wants a full panel of seven justices or judges to consider the case.
Church officials argue the high court's decision wrongly concluded that a lower court judge agreed to allow the newspapers to intervene in the case. They say the trial court judge abused his discretion and want a new hearing on whether the papers have a right to intervene.
"The decision is, therefore, inconsistent with fundamental fairness and violates the defendants' right to due process,'' attorney John Farley wrote for the diocese.
IRELAND
Irish Independent
The Bishop of Killaloe has criticised false abuse allegations made against Catholic priests, saying they are becoming far too commonplace and are damaging people's good reputations.
Willie Walsh made the comment after confirming that the former Bishop of Galway, Eamon Casey, is contesting an undisclosed allegation made against him.
Bishop Walsh confirmed today that he had received a phonecall from Dr Casey yesterday in which he proclaimed his innocence.
Dr Casey, who left Galway in 1992 after it emerged that he had fathered a son with an American woman, stood down from his ministry in Britain last week after the new allegation came to light.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Toledo Blade
By JIM PROVANCE
BLADE COLUMBUS BUREAU
COLUMBUS - In an unprecedented move, a Catholic bishop will testify next week before an Ohio legislative panel, a sign of how strongly the church wants to stop a bill allowing lawsuits alleging sexual abuse as long as 35 years ago.
"It's important they hear from the shepherd of the flock, that he explain what the church has committed itself to doing," said Tim Luckhaupt, executive head of Catholic Conference of Ohio. "We know people have been harmed, and we want to show what we are trying to do is help those people and make sure it doesn't happen again."
He said no final decision has been made as to which bishop will appear next Thursday. Ohio bishops have already taken the highly unusual step of personally meeting behind closed doors with legislative leaders on the controversial issue.
The House Judiciary Committee is considering a bill opening a one-time, one-year window for victims of child sexual abuse as long ago as 1970 to file lawsuits against their abusers as well as those they contend shielded them.
The Senate passed the bill unanimously last spring.
WATERBURY (CT)
WTNH
(Waterbury-AP, Dec. 8, 2005 5:30 PM) _ Two girls have sued a former church organist and a church in Derby over sexual abuse charges.
The girls, who were not identified in legal papers filed in Waterbury Superior Court, said Robert Nelson showed pornographic videos and photos and engaged in sex with the girls for about four years beginning in 2000.
Lawyers for the girls say the 51-year-old Nelson pleaded guilty in October to sexual assault.
Immanuel St. James Episcopal Church also was sued. The lawsuit accuses the church of negligent hiring.
WATERBURY (CT)
Republican-American
Friday, December 9, 2005
BY KATHY HALLORAN and WILL SISS
Republican-American
WATERBURY -- A civil suit has been filed in Superior Court on behalf of two underage Oxford girls against Immanuel St. James Episcopal Church in Derby and the church's former organist, Robert Nelson.
The girls' attorneys, Martin J. Minnella and Timothy C. Moynahan, of Waterbury filed the suit Thursday. The defendants are seeking more than $15,000 in damages as a result of years of sexual abuse at the hands of Nelson, Moynahan said.
The suit alleges the girls -- who are identified in the suit as Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2 -- were sexually assaulted over a period of years by Nelson and that the church failed to properly check Nelson's background before hiring him.
Nelson, 51, formerly of Naugatuck, has prior convictions for risk of injury to a minor from incidents in 1989 and 1990 in Newtown and Trumbull.
He recently pleaded guilty to sexual assault on the two girls in the first degree, second degree and fourth degree, and could serve 15 years. He is currently incarcerated in the Cheshire Correctional Institution.
FORT WORTH (TX)
Star-Telegram
By BEN TINSLEY
STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER
FORT WORTH - The pastor and principal of a Haltom City Baptist church and school is on trial this week, accused of sexually molesting a boy he mentored after the child's father died several years ago.
Jay Preston Connell, 53, of Landmark Baptist Church and Landmark Christian Academy is charged with four counts of indecency with a child by contact and one count of indecent exposure to a child. Prosecutors say the boy, who last attended Connell's school in April 2004, had been mentored by Connell since age 7 and molested over at least five years. The boy is now 16.
"The child's father was elderly and passed away at some point during their seven-year relationship," prosecutor Steve Jumes said. "That's how the defendant was able to step into the kid's life. The mother trusted him and relied on him to be a father."
Defense attorney Walt Cleveland said that's exactly what his client did: mentor the child. Connell did nothing illegal, Cleveland said.
"He didn't do anything that the child's mother didn't ask him to, and there was no sexual intent involved in anything Dr. Connell did," Cleveland said. "It's our contention the state took something quite innocent and caring toward the child and imposed its own mindset, making it into something lewd and malicious. And that's not right."
COLUMBUS (OH)
NBC 4i
POSTED: 4:02 pm EST December 8, 2005
UPDATED: 6:42 pm EST December 8, 2005
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Emotional testimony was heard Thursday at the Statehouse, where supporters of a bill that deals with sex abuse and clergy voiced their opinions.
Anna Marie Martinez, of Germantown, Md., claims to be the victim of sexual abuse at the hands of a Catholic priest.
She appeared at the Ohio Statehouse to urge house lawmakers to pass Senate Bill 17, NBC 4's John Ivanic reported.
"When I was young, when I was abused, there was nowhere to go," Martinez said. "There were no sexual assault units in the police department."
MASSACHUSETTS
The Standard-Times
By JACK SPILLANE, Standard-Times staff writer
An organization of lay Catholics will hold a candlelight vigil Sunday at Bishop George W. Coleman's office to protest the Vatican's near-ban on homosexual seminarians.
The local Voice of the Faithful group, which has been prohibited from meeting in Fall River Diocese facilities, expects about 25 people to attend, said George Lee, a parishioner at St. Patrick's in Somerset and a Voice member.
Its participants are not worried about getting in trouble with the Fall River bishop, he said.
"This is about supporting priests," he said.
Voice of the Faithful SouthCoast is the local chapter of a national group that has criticized church hierarchy in the wake of the sexual abuse crisis
The group is now inviting its members to show support for Catholic priests regardless of their sexual orientation. Besides Fall River, vigils will take place in Boston, Springfield, Los Angeles, Chicago and Philadelphia.
MOBILE (AL)
Montgomery Advertiser
MOBILE -- A Roman Catholic priest, the Rev. Timothy Wayne Evans, has been placed on administrative leave following allegations of sexual and substance abuse involving minors, Archbishop Oscar H. Lipscomb said in a statement Thursday.
The Mobile County district attorney has been notified of the allegations.
Lipscomb placed Evans on leave Monday after interviewing him. No further details were released. Evans could not be reached for comment.
Evans was serving as pastor of St. Margaret's Catholic Church in Bayou La Batre when the archdiocese received the complaint Dec. 2.
TEXAS
Midland Reporter-Telegram
Bob Campbell
Staff Writer
Midland Reporter-Telegram
12/09/2005
District Judge George Gilles has set arguments for 10 a.m. Dec. 16 on pre-trial motions in a sexual abuse lawsuit against former Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church Rev. Domingo Gonzalez Estrada, the Catholic Diocese and bishop of San Angelo.
Filed in 142nd District Court by Dallas attorney Lori Watson, the lawsuit alleges the now 64-year-old priest molested a now 22-year-old Midland man genitally and anally six times from 1989-93. Unspecified damages are sought.
Estrada, who is still a priest in the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate order and living in the San Antonio area, was tried on six felony charges and acquitted on all counts Dec. 2, 2004, by a 238th District Court jury.
"The judge will be hearing two motions for summary judgment and a motion to complete the interrogatory," Watson's legal assistant told the Reporter-Telegram Thursday afternoon. "We will also get a scheduling order."
She explained that a scheduling order will outline the steps leading to a trial.
When asked if Estrada's criminal acquittals will make a civil settlement more difficult to win, Watson's spokeswoman said Watson, a partner in the Windle Turley Law Offices firm, will not comment on that issue before trial.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Cleveland Plain Dealer
Friday, December 09, 2005
Julie Carr Smyth
Plain Dealer Bureau
Columbus- Robert Riestenberg said his principal at a Catholic high school in Cincinnati sexually molested him the day after his father died of cancer.
Mary Kessler said she was mourning the death of her young brother in a car accident when she was raped by the priest who had taken her grieving family under his wing.
Joelle Casteix was 15 when, bruised and bloody, she went to the office of her Catholic high school to report being abused by her choir director.
"They told me, 'Isn't it nice to be in love?' " said Casteix, 35, on a cross-country trip from California to support an Ohio bill aimed at cracking down on sexual abuse by priests and other religious leaders.
Riestenberg, Kessler, Casteix and dozens of others who say they are abuse victims testified Thursday in the second marathon hearing in a month on the proposal, sponsored by Sen. Bob Spada, Republican of North Royalton. It would mandate that church officials report known abuse, and it would open a one-year window for abuse victims to file civil lawsuits against the church.
ALABAMA
Mobile Register
Friday, December 09, 2005
By ANDY NETZEL
Staff Reporter
A Roman Catholic priest has been accused of sexually abusing a teenage boy while serving in Bayou La Batre, Coden, Daphne or Monroeville, according to church and law enforcement officials. His tenure as a priest includes 17 months as the head of youth ministry for the Archdiocese of Mobile.
The Rev. Timothy Wayne Evans, 39, has been put on administrative leave from his duties as the pastor of St. Margaret's Catholic Church in Bayou La Batre and St. Michael's in Coden. Evans is under investigation by the Mobile County district attorney's office, but no charges have been filed, officials with that office said Thursday. Officials declined to state where and exactly when the alleged abuse occurred.
"We regret this, of course," said the Rev. Jim Cink, director of the Mobile Archdiocesan Office of Child Protection. "We want to say we're sorry to this family, and we have. We want to care for the family, and we will care for them."
Southern Voice
Friday, December 09, 2005
THE VATICAN FINALLY issued its “instruction” on gay seminarians last month, and it has profound practical, political and theological implications.
Practically, the Vatican has taken a definitive stand: no gay seminarians!
So, out gay men will stop entering the seminary. Only gay men who don’t know themselves or who are lying will be ordained. Pious platitudes will cover over all sexuality.
The Roman Catholic priesthood will remain a hideaway for sexually immature men of every stripe. And the sexual abuse that this new policy is supposed to address will go on, business as usual.
INDIANA
The Journal Gazette
By Rebecca S. Green
The Journal Gazette
The Fort Wayne-South Bend Catholic Diocese issued an update on sexual abuse allegations within the diocese Thursday in the aftermath of the national clergy abuse scandal, and the number of priests accused of abuse within the local diocese since 1950 remains at 16.
That is the same number of accused priests announced by Bishop John M. D’Arcy in December 2003. But since the end of 2003, an additional five allegations were leveled against those 16 priests. Another credible allegation of sexual abuse, occurring more than 60 years ago, was made against a priest who could not be identified, according to the diocese, which brings the number of allegations since the end of 2003 to six.
Diocesan officials conducted an extensive investigation into the identity of the accused priest, who is believed to be a priest from a religious order or community, but were unable to identify him, the diocese said.
All of the allegations against the 16 priests are alleged to have occurred 20 or more years ago, according to the diocese.
MASSACHUSETTS
Worcester Telegram & Gazette
By Kathleen A. Shaw TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
kshaw@telegram.com
This is the time of year when Christians, and many in this area are Catholics, are busy wrapping Christmas gifts.
Voice of the Faithful, an organization of Catholic lay people and priests, is asking Catholics to do something a little different this weekend.
The request is to snip off a piece of green ribbon and wear it to weekend Masses in honor of the good priests, regardless of sexual orientation, as a way of showing them support at a time when many are demoralized by the sexual abuse scandal that has engulfed the Catholic church and a recent instruction from the Vatican stating that homosexual men are not welcome in seminaries. The green ribbon should be worn so that it is visible, VOTF said.
Raymond Joyce, VOTF executive director, said yesterday that bishops may say differently, but VOTF members know that many good priests feel demoralized. He added that VOTF believes that what the organization calls priests of integrity, whether gay or not, are living by their promise of celibacy.
VOTF leadership said excluding homosexuals from the priesthood is not a solution to the clergy sexual abuse crisis.
“This show of support for priests is for all Catholics, and not just members of Voice of the Faithful,” he said.
“We are told in Acts of the Apostles that the early Christian community was recognized when observers would say of them, ‘See how they love one another.’ What better time to live that message?” he said.
The organization chose green because it is a liturgical color worn by priests during Masses at certain times of the year, green ribbon is readily available this time of the year because of Christmas gift wrapping, and it is not associated with any other worthy causes.
Mary Keville of St. Theresa’s parish, Harvard, said members of her parish unit of Voice of the Faithful will wear green ribbons at all Masses this weekend and will continue through the rest of the month. She was instrumental in bringing Voice of the Faithful to the Diocese of Worcester after the national organization was founded in Boston in 2002 as a response to the sexual abuse crisis. The organization now has chapters abroad and claims more than 30,000 members.
In the Worcester diocese, VOTF has given support to clergy abuse survivors. The organization’s goal also is to support those they call “priests of integrity.”
The green ribbon campaign is being organized throughout the country and began through e-mails to its 30,000 members throughout the United States.
In addition to ribbons, VOTF affiliates will hold prayer candlelight vigils across the country, including Cathedral of Our Lady of Angels in Los Angeles; the Chicago chancery office; Cathedral of the Holy Cross, Boston; the Fall River chancery office; St. Michael’s Cathedral, Springfield; Sts. Peter & Paul Cathedral, Philadelphia.
“We invite you to join a national gesture of our conviction that a vocation to the priesthood is not and should not be restricted by one’s sexuality. As was quoted in the Tablet by Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, ‘We should be more attentive to whom our seminarians may be inclined to hate than whom they love. Racialism, misogyny and homophobia would all be signs that someone could not be a good model of Christ,” the organization said in e-mails to members.
DETROIT (MI)
Mlive.com
12/8/2005, 9:28 a.m. ET
The Associated Press
DETROIT (AP) — The Vatican has concurred with the Archdiocese of Detroit's decision to remove two priests from their ministry due to sex-related misconduct allegations.
C. Richard Kelly, 62, former pastor of St. Thomas a'Becket Catholic Church in Wayne County's Canton Township, was removed from his post in 2004 after an allegation of sexual misconduct with a boy early in his ministry.
In 2003, the diocese also removed Timothy Szott, 58, former pastor of St. Lawrence Catholic Church in Utica, when child pornography was found on his computer. He later pleaded no contest to pornography charges and was sentenced to probation.
NEW YORK
Buffalo News
By JAY TOKASZ
News Staff Reporter
12/8/2005
On at least one point, most Catholics agree: The American church needs more priests.
But the latest directive from the Vatican regarding whether gay men are eligible for that role is creating little unanimity.
Some Catholics are concerned that the document scapegoats gay priests for the church's clergy sex-abuse scandal and ultimately will shut out highly qualified gay men from the priesthood.
Others applaud the Vatican instruction as a long-overdue crackdown on a permissive "gay subculture" in seminaries. They think the directive will spur new vocations, especially among heterosexual men put off by the gay subculture.
"I pray to God that this will go a long way toward correcting the situation," said Raymond Duggan, a Hamburg resident and parishioner of SS. Peter & Paul Church. "I hope it works. I think it's badly needed."
MOBILE (AL)
Al.com
12/8/2005, 11:49 a.m. CT
The Associated Press
MOBILE, Ala. (AP) — A Roman Catholic priest, the Rev. Timothy Wayne Evans, has been placed on administrative leave following allegations of sexual and substance abuse involving minors, Archbishop Oscar H. Lipscomb said in a statement Thursday.
The Mobile County district attorney has been notified of the allegations.
Lipscomb placed Evans on leave Monday after interviewing him. No further details were released. Evans could not be reached for comment.
Evans was serving as pastor of St. Margaret's Catholic Church in Bayou La Batre when the archdiocese received the complaint Dec. 2.
A church representative, the Rev. James J. Cink, immediately contacted the family making the complaint and apologized, according to the statement.
IRELAND
IOL
08/12/2005 - 10:47:04
The Labour Party is demanding an extension to the remit of the Residential Institutions Redress Board.
The party said the current remit was too narrow and should be extended to cover further institutions and care homes.
National Review
By Father Raymond J. de Souza
In the week since the Vatican released its new "Instruction" on the admission of men with homosexual tendencies to seminaries or to Holy Orders, there has been an impressive amount of commentary on what exactly it means. While the release of a Vatican document is always accompanied by commentators who argue mightily that it does not mean what it in fact plainly says, this time there is some genuine uncertainty about how best to interpret the Instruction — and from quarters which are by no means lacking in fidelity to Church teaching.
The key passage says that "those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called "gay culture" should not be admitted to seminaries or ordained priests.
The first and third categories seem clear enough. A man who is sexually active with others — men or women — clearly cannot be admitted to the seminary unless and until he has learned to live chastely. As for the "gay culture," it seems obvious that a potential priest cannot support initiatives which encourage homosexual acts, or even the affirmation of the homosexual orientation as something good in itself.
BOSTON (MA)
In Newsweekly
Chuck Colbert December 07, 2005
Unconvinced the Vatican's new criteria banning gay seminarians address root causes of clerical abuse, women who were abused by priests demonstrated on Thurs., Dec. 1, outside chancery offices of the Boston Archdiocese.
While taking aim at a new Vatican document released earlier last week, which says men "who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called 'gay culture'" are not suitable for priestly ordination, the female survivors also took issue with Archbishop Sean P. O'Malley's recent letter on homosexuality, which local media widely considered a positive outreach effort.
"Perhaps the public ¦ would like to continue to think that priests abused altar boys and somehow their daughters are safe," said Ann Hagan Webb, New England coordinator for Survivors Network for those Abused by Priests, or SNAP. "We are here to dispel that myth," she added. "We were not safe. And homosexual orientation in our abusers had nothing to do with it."
Hagan Webb, a psychologist, who alleges her abuse by a monsignor from kindergarten through the seventh grade, took issue specifically with church officials and reports that suggest 80 percent to 90 percent of sex abuse victims were boys.
PENSACOLA (FL)
The Ledger
A former minister charged with soliciting sex on the Internet from an investigator posing as a teenager will be sentenced Dec. 28.
Michael Anthony Harris, 43, has pleaded no contest to attempted lewd or lascivious battery and using a computer to solicit the sexual conduct of a crime, according to court documents.
At the time of the incident, Harris was pastor at St. Paul Lutheran Church.
COLUMBUS (OH)
Canton Repository
By PAUL E. KOSTYU COPLEY COLUMBUS BUREAU CHIEF
COLUMBUS - Graphic details about sex, fear and violations of state code filled a 10-hour hearing that will determine whether fired counselor Dennis Bliss will keep his license.
Part of that hearing included listening to a 13-minute recording between Bliss and a former client about having sex in her bedroom.
A second day of testimony, which is expected to include 13 witnesses, begins this morning.
The Plain Township man was fired by Nova Behavioral Health Services after he was accused of inappropriate behavior and relationships with his clients. ...
Bliss, a suspended Catholic priest, has been out of work for 10 months, according to his attorney, Donald Hicks of Akron. Bliss also is accused of using his home as a church attended by Nova clients.
BOSTON (MA)
Foster's Daily Democrat
BOSTON (AP) — Former Attorney General Scott Harshbarger has resigned in frustration as head of the panel appointed by Gov. Mitt Romney to reform the state's prison system, saying the governor has neglected the issue as he contemplates a run for president.
Harshbarger said too little has been done since the death behind bars of convicted pedophile and former priest John Geoghan in August 2003, allegedly at the hands of a convicted murderer.
The death led to widespread calls for a top-to-bottom prison review, including inmate assignment policies, after it was disclosed that low-risk offenders are sometimes housed alongside the state's most hardened criminals.
"I can feel it this fall: There has not been a sense of urgency," Harshbarger told The Boston Globe. "I don' see it in the executive. I don't see it in the Legislature. I don't see it in the agencies. I don't see the focus."
TRENTON (NJ)
The Times
Thursday, December 08, 2005
By KRYSTAL KNAPP
Staff Writer
A bill that would remove the shield protecting charities from liability in child sex assault cases and grant new powers to abuse victims in New Jersey is finally poised to become a law.
More than 1 1/2 years after the state Senate overwhelmingly voted to amend a state law known as the Charitable Immunity Act that protects schools, churches and other nonprofits from civil lawsuits, the Assembly is set to consider the legislation.
A bill that would eliminate protection in the case of child sex abuse was posted yesterday and will be considered at the Assembly's 1 p.m. voting session Monday.
Sydney Star Observer
by Myles Wearring
The Vatican’s ban on gay priests has come under fire from gay Catholic organisations, and seen at least one US priest quit his post.
The Reverend Leonard Walker, from the Queen of Peace church in Arizona, resigned because he no longer felt comfortable “wearing the uniform” of the priesthood.
“It’s like a Jew wearing a Nazi uniform,” Walker said. “I could no longer stay in that institution with any amount of integrity.”
Debbie Weill, executive director of Dignity USA, a gay and lesbian Catholic group, said the Vatican was using gay people as scapegoats.
HARRISBURG (PA)
The Morning Call
By Martha Raffaele
Of The Associated Press
HARRISBURG | Several reforms recommended by a grand jury that investigated alleged sexual abuse by Catholic priests in Philadelphia have emerged in bills introduced recently in the state Legislature.
The House Judiciary Committee discussed but did not vote Tuesday on any of the six bills introduced the day before, including measures that would lift the statute of limitations on criminal charges of sexual assault against children — currently a victim's 30th birthday — and allow unincorporated associations to be subject to criminal prosecution just as corporations are.
Rep. Dennis O'Brien, R-Philadelphia, the committee's chairman, said he hoped the bills would be sent to the full House in time for a vote before the Christmas break.
The grand jury report released in September documented assaults on minors by more than 60 priests since 1967 and alleged that church leaders covered up the abuse. However, the panel said it could not bring criminal charges against the church or its priests, citing constraints in state law.
IOWA
Des Moines Register
A former Jefferson altar boy who sued the Rev. George McFadden and the Sioux City Catholic Diocese, alleging he had been sexually abused by the priest, is appealing his case to the Iowa Supreme Court.
Daniel Nash, 47, filed his lawsuit in April 2004, alleging that McFadden had gained his trust and then, from 1969 to 1973, sexually abused him at the St. Joseph's Church rectory, vestry and parish hall.
Woodbury County District Judge Duane Hoffmeyer dismissed the case in June 2005, ruling Nash waited too long to sue. Patrick Hopkins, Nash's attorney, filed the appeal Dec. 2.
No other Iowa case involving alleged child sex abuse by a clergyman has been dismissed because of expiration of the statute of limitations.
In 2004, Scott County District Judge Charles Pelton denied attempts by the Diocese of Davenport to have four cases dismissed because of expiration of the statute of limitations.
CANADA
Parry Sound North Star
by Grand Council Chief John Beaucage - Wednesday, December 7, 2005
John Macfie saves his most important statement for last in his November 30 assessment of Indian Residential Schools.
“I never experienced the system from the inside,” he admits, after devoting several hundred words to offer his opinion to North Star readers that the church-operated and government-mandated schools were not “the hellholes they are now made out to be.”
That opinion is apparently based on his personal acquaintance over a brief period with a handful of survivors–we don’t call them students–of just one of the notorious networks of over 100 residential schools.
NEW YORK
Newsday
BY CAROL EISENBERG
STAFF WRITER
December 7, 2005
An Ozone Park pastor who pleaded guilty three years ago to stealing nearly $100,000 from his working-class parish to pay for trips to a gay resort, a time share in Mexico and a luxury car, still gets a monthly stipend from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn.
The Rev. John Thompson, who pled guilty to a felony charge of grand larceny in September 2002, said in a deposition last month that he continues to receive a check of about $1,700 a month from the church, although he's barred from presenting himself as a priest or celebrating Mass.
Thompson gave the deposition last month in connection with a $5 million lawsuit brought by Barbara Samide, the former principal of St. Elizabeth's School, who lost her job three years ago after she accused him of stealing from the parish and sexually abusing her. Samide sued Thompson, as well as the diocese, saying it failed to protect her. A judge later ordered the diocese to pay her for the duration of her contract, through August 2003.
"To me it's absolutely outrageous that he's getting paid," said Michael Dowd of Manhattan, Samide's attorney. "This is a guy who stole money from a poor parish. Barbara Samide didn't get any money when she reported him. The diocese put her on unpaid leave, and we were trying to raise money for her to feed her family."
SEATTLE (WA)
King County Journal
2005-11-30
by Noel S. Brady
Journal Reporter
One of two young men wanted by police for allegedly molesting a young boy while living with an Eastside group known to many as a cult has surrendered to authorities.
Justin Kirkland, 20, a member of the Tridentine Latin Rite Church, was being held Tuesday night held in lieu of $75,000 bail after being booked at the King County Jail in Seattle on Monday morning, nearly a year after he was charged with two counts of first-degree rape of a child.
Police are still looking for Michael W. Muratore, 21, a third member of the church who was charged Nov. 18 with first-degree child molestation for crimes against the same victim.
The mother of the now-13-year-old boy, whom Kirkland and two other young men are accused of molesting over three years beginning when the boy was 8, said she believes recent media converge about the church pressured its leaders to send Kirkland to authorities. She is not being named to protect the privacy of her son.
UNITED STATES
Irish Voice
By Georgina Brennan
The deadline for victims of abuse in Irish child care institutions to file claims for redress is December 15, 2005. Once that deadline passes anyone who suffered cruel and harrowing abuse at those institutions between 1920 and 1970 will continue to suffer in silence without any compensation.
The new executive director of the Coalition of Irish Immigration Centers, Sheila Gleeson, has issued a fresh appeal for U.S.-based victims to come forward before it’s too late.
“Late applications will not be accepted and so it is important to start the application process immediately,” Gleeson told the Irish Voice.
An estimated 12,000 victims who were denied a proper upbringing, barely learned to read and write and suffered physical, sexual and emotional abuse while resident in Irish industrial schools, reformatories, orphanages and other institutions have not come forward. Many are thought to be residing in the U.S. ...
Five thousand claimants have already launched claims connected to the abuse, starvation and cruelty in the Church-managed institutions. Awards that have been made by the Redress Board vary between €50,000 and €300,000.
IRELAND
One in Four
A priest in the Kerry diocese has stood aside while a single complaint of “inappropriate behaviour” towards an adult is investigated by the gardai.
The Bishop of Kerry, Dr Bill Murphy, last night confirmed the complaint. The allegation against the priest dates back more than 20 years, according to a statement issued by Kerry diocesan spokesman Fr Rory O’Sullivan. The Health Service Executive (HSE) had also been informed of the complaint, understood to involve a male.
Fr O’Sullivan said the priest had been active in ministry until the complaint was received. No statement was read out at weekend masses in his parish, but Bishop Murphy had met key people in the parish and informed them of the situation. Fr O’Sullivan said these people were asked to pass on the information to parishioners. Following publication of the Ferns Report in October, Bishop Murphy said no priest in active ministry in his diocese was currently under investigation. Fr O’Sullivan said the latest complaint was made in recent weeks.
IRELAND
One in Four
A retired schoolteacher and priest in his 80s has brought High Court proceedings aimed at preventing his trial on 37 charges of indecent assault of three former pupils.
Neither the man nor the school can be named for legal reasons. The DPP is opposing the application.
Deirdre Murphy SC, for the applicant, said the alleged assaults were said to have occurred between 1974 and 1981. She submitted that the delay between the alleged assaults, the making of the complaints and her client's prosecution would prejudice his right to a fair trial and had breached his right to a trial with reasonable expedition.
EULESS (TX)
The Dallas Morning News
05:48 PM CST on Tuesday, December 6, 2005
By DEBRA DENNIS / The Dallas Morning News
The senior pastor of the First United Methodist Church in Euless was suspended Tuesday for 90 days following allegations he fondled a man.
The Rev. James Leonard Finley, 68, was suspended by Bishop Ben R. Chamness, who oversees more than 300 churches as part of the Central Texas Conference of the United Methodist Church. Mr. Finley was relieved of all pastoral duties, said Carolyn Stephens, a spokeswoman for the conference.
The 1,400-member church will be headed by Charles McClure, a retired minister, Ms. Stephens said.
Mr. Finley was arrested last week and charged with public lewdness, a misdemeanor. He is accused of fondling a 21-year-old man at his home.
PENSACOLA (FL)
Pensacola News Journal
Kristen Rasmussen
@PensacolaNewsJournal.com
A former local pastor faces up to five years in prison after pleading no contest to charges that he solicited sex over the Internet from a sheriff's deputy posing as a teenage boy.
Michael Anthony Harris, 43, is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 28 on the third-degree felony charges of attempted lewd or lascivious battery and using a computer to solicit the sexual conduct of a crime, according to court documents.
Harris served as pastor at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Pensacola until he resigned shortly after his arrest on April 13.
Ron Sedlacek, a longtime member of St. Paul's, said the congregation is being led by an interim pastor and has "healed very well" in the months since Harris was arrested and resigned.
"We have a lot of good people in the church, and we have some good plans," Sedlacek said. "We recognize that things happen to all people, but it's not something to get mired down in. We need to move ahead.
ALABAMA
Shelby County Reporter
By PATRICK CROTTY / Staff Writer
(Updated: Tuesday, December 6, 2005 5:30 PM CST)
A former Shelby County pastor and his wife pled guilty last week to raping and sodomizing their two children almost 18 years ago.
Ralph Randall Melton and his wife, Cathy G. Melton, of Jemison, pled guilty to first-degree rape and sodomy in Chilton County District Court. The couple is awaiting sentencing.
Melton was arrested in April 2004 after his daughter filed charges with the Chilton County Sheriff’s Office.
Invesitgators said Melton and his wife raped his then-15-year-old daughter repeatedly between 1975 and 1987.
Investigators began collecting evidence after the victim filed a complaint against her father in November 2003. The couple’s son also filed charges after his sister stepped forward, and the wife was also arrested.
Melton was the pastor of Prospect Baptist Church in Wilsonville at the time of his arrest. He also served as pastor of New Salem Baptist Church in Thorsby and Big Springs Baptist Church in Vida.
PENSACOLA (FL)
The Ledger
The Associated Press
PENSACOLA, Fla.
A former minister charged with soliciting sex on the Internet from an investigator posing as a teenager will be sentenced Dec. 28.
Michael Anthony Harris, 43, has pleaded no contest to attempted lewd or lascivious battery and using a computer to solicit the sexual conduct of a crime, according to court documents.
At the time of the incident, Harris was pastor at St. Paul Lutheran Church.
He was arrested April 13 after going to a soccer field to meet with a 14-year-old boy who was actually an undercover officer.
EULESS (TX)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
By CAREN M. PENLAND
SPECIAL TO THE STAR-TELEGRAM
EULESS -- Methodist church officials placed a pastor accused of molesting a 21-year-old man on a 90-day suspension Tuesday, pending the outcome of an internal investigation.
Bishop Ben Chamness has called for a special meeting Dec. 14 of top officials of the 28-county Central Texas Conference of the United Methodist Church to discuss further disciplinary action against the Rev. James L. Finley, 68.
They will determine then whether to permanently relieve Finley of his post as senior pastor of First United Methodist Church of Euless, conference spokeswoman Carolyn Stephens said.
"What happens at that meeting depends on pastor Finley," Stephens said. "He has not indicated that he wishes to resign, though he has met with the bishop to discuss the situation."
EULESS (TX)
KRIS
EULESS, Texas The senior pastor of the First United Methodist Church in the Fort Worth suburb of Euless has been suspended for 90 days.
That's after the Reverend James Leonard Finley was accused of fondling a man.
The 68-year-old minister was suspended yesterday by Bishop Ben R. Chamness, who oversees more than 300 churches as part of the Central Texas Conference of the United Methodist Church.
A conference spokeswoman says Finley's been relieved of all pastoral duties and that the 14-hundred-member church will be headed by a retired minister.
TRENTON (NJ)
Newsday
By ANGELA DELLI SANTI
Associated Press Writer
December 6, 2005, 8:32 PM EST
TRENTON, N.J. -- A year and a half after the state Senate voted to change the law shielding charities from liability in child sex assault cases, the state Assembly appears poised to finally consider the legislation next week.
The bill would grant new powers to child sex abuse victims in New Jersey, where the law now protects schools, churches and other nonprofits from being held liable for criminal actions of their employees.
New Jersey is one of only three states in the country with charitable immunity laws still on the books. The others are Alabama and Tennessee.
The bill would allow sex abuse victims to pursue lawsuits and collect damages from an organization if they can show that it acted negligently by hiring or employing sexual predators. Those abused as children could file lawsuits years later as adults.
"I've had discussions with the speaker and the majority leader; they've agreed to put it up for a vote," said Assemblyman Neil Cohen, D-Union, a sponsor of the legislation. "Everyone is now very excited."
PENNSYLVANIA
Zenit
WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, Pennsylvania, DEC. 6, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Many priests grow in holiness and happiness in their ministry as a result of the healing of their childhood and adolescent male insecurity, loneliness and anger and, subsequently, their same-sex attractions.
So says Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons, a psychiatrist, author and contributor to the Catholic Medical Association's document "Homosexuality and Hope."
Fitzgibbons shared with ZENIT how some seminarians, candidates for the seminary, and priests can make strides in resolving their homosexual tendencies, and what bishops and religious superiors can do to help them.
Part 1 of this interview appeared Monday.
Q: How can spiritual directors help seminarians or priests who have same-sex attractions?
Fitzgibbons: Spiritual directors can help seminarians and priests by understanding that same-sex attractions are treatable and are not genetically determined. They can encourage seminarians and priests to face their emotional pain with the Lord's help, particularly their loneliness.
MEXICO
Union-Tribune
By E. Eduardo Castillo
ASSOCIATED PRESS
1:32 p.m. December 6, 2005
MEXICO CITY – A U.S. group representing people allegedly sexually abused by Catholic priests demanded Tuesday that President Vicente Fox do more to bring accused Mexican clergy to justice.
Leaders of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, are visiting Mexico this week to pressure the government.
The group wrote to Fox a year ago, urging him to step up efforts to prosecute accused priests, among them the Rev. Nicolas Aguilar, who has been charged in California with 19 felony counts of committing lewd acts on a child.
Aguilar worked in Los Angeles in 1987 and later served as a priest in Mexico. He disappeared after similar accusations arose against him in this country. The group, which held a news conference Tuesday, said Fox never responded to its letter.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Inquirer
By Tom Ferrick Jr.
Inquirer Columnist
Here is a case to ponder over your coffee and bagel.
In a nearby community, folks are outraged over a scandal involving a baseball coach accused of sexually abusing a boy on one of his teams.
The incident happened years ago but came to light only recently because the victim - now in his 30s - stepped forward to confront the man, known as Coach Brad.
After the case is publicized, other victims come forward. Investigators find a half-dozen credible cases of sexual abuse but cannot prosecute - the statute of limitations has run out.
Denied their day in criminal court, the victims file a civil suit, seeking damages from Coach Brad. They say the incidents - involving fondling and oral and anal sex - profoundly harmed them. Some took to drugs, some to alcohol; some suffer from mental illness.
At the trial, the coach's elderly father shows up to make a personal plea. The father, a wealthy man, is beloved in the community because of his generosity.
He tells the judge that his son's assets are tied to a family trust. If the jury awards the victims a large settlement, the trust will have to be used to pay it.
The father tells the judge that if the trust is depleted, its many charities will suffer: agencies that aid the elderly and the homeless, the poor and needy children in the community.
It's your call
Don't create a second set of victims, the father tells the judge. Please dismiss this suit.
If you were the judge, what would you decide?
This is a hypothetical case, but if it sounds familiar, there's a reason.
Change the name from Coach Brad to Father Brad. Make the number of known perps 63; have the victims number in the hundreds. Substitute Cardinal Justin Rigali for the father and - voila! - you have the Philadelphia clergy-abuse scandal.
HARRISBURG (PA)
philly.com
MARTHA RAFFAELE
Associated Press
HARRISBURG, Pa. - Several reforms recommended by a grand jury that investigated alleged sexual abuse by Catholic priests in Philadelphia have emerged in bills introduced recently in the state Legislature.
The House Judiciary Committee discussed but did not vote Tuesday on any of the six bills introduced the day before, including measures that would lift the statute of limitations on criminal charges of sexual assault against children - currently a victim's 30th birthday - and allow unincorporated associations to be subject to criminal prosecution just as corporations are.
Rep. Dennis O'Brien, R-Philadelphia, the committee's chairman, said he hoped the bills would be sent to the full House in time for a vote before the Christmas break.
The grand jury report released in September documented assaults on minors by more than 60 priests since 1967 and alleged that church leaders covered up the abuse. However, the panel said it could not bring criminal charges against the church or its priests, citing constraints in state law.
OREGON
The Oregonian
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
STEVE WOODWARD
After hearing more than three hours of sometimes heated debate Tuesday, a U.S. bankruptcy judge will now decide who owns the pews that Catholics in Western Oregon sit in each Sunday.
The issue before Judge Elizabeth Perris is whether parish property belongs to individual parishes or to the Archdiocese of Portland, which encompasses 124 parishes, three high schools and about 400,000 parishioners. The ruling could determine whether the parishes' estimated $500 million in real estate, cash and investments is available to pay millions of dollars in child sexual-abuse claims.
Perris has set no timetable, although she is expected to rule within the next several weeks. It's also possible that she will skip a ruling and order a trial instead. A trial would enable her to consider factual evidence, in addition to the purely legal arguments that lawyers have presented so far.
The Advocate
By Mary E. Hunt
An Advocate.com exclusive posted, December 6, 2005
The Vatican has released a document banning priests “who are actively homosexual, have deep-seated homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called ‘gay culture.’” Rome has been floating trial balloons for some time about this document to see what level of antigay rhetoric it can get away with. After months of document leaks, the Vatican had already made its point: Local bishops and religious superiors will be expected to scrutinize seminaries lest they become hideaways of gay culture. At this point the actual text of the document is irrelevant; dictatorships always rely more on self-censorship through fear and intimidation than actual punishment to accomplish their goals.
The galling fact is that this document, while purporting to “clarify” church teaching or “purify” the priesthood, is really nothing more than an effort to link the criminal activity of pedophile priests with homosexuality and to distract from the reprehensible behavior of bishops who covered up their misconduct. This is an absurd gambit on the part of the Vatican. Homosexuality has no relationship to child sexual abuse. This scandal has made transparent an untenable “kyriarchal” system—a model of church that locates power, both sacramental and temporal, in the hands of a few men who literally lord over the laity, speaking and acting in the name of all believers when in fact they are but a tiny percentage of the community.
It is time for a Stonewall moment.
ANCHORAGE (AK)
WPRI
ANCHORAGE, Alaska A fourth man has joined a lawsuit accusing a former Anchorage, Alaska Catholic priest of sexual assault.
The updated lawsuit names the Reverend Francis Murphy, the Anchorage Archdiocese, the Boston Archdiocese and the Missionary Society of St. James the Apostle as defendants.
Murphy -- now in his 70s -- left Alaska in 1985 for alcohol treatment and resumed ministerial duties under the Boston Archdiocese.
After another sexual abuse allegation surfaced, he retired in 1995 and moved to New Mexico, working as a priest until previous allegations came to light.
MEXICO
The Daily Journal
MEXICO CITY (AP) – Mexico is not doing enough to bring clergy accused of sexual abuse to justice, a U.S. group representing people allegedly abused by Catholic priests said on Tuesday.
Leaders of the Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, known as SNAP, are visiting Mexico this week to pressure President Vicente Fox to take action.
“We want President Fox to assure us there will be justice and that any case against a priest will be treated the same as any case against a person who abuses children,” said Eric Barragán, the group’s spokesman.
The group wrote to President Vicente Fox a year ago, urging him to step up efforts to prosecute accused priests, among them the Rev. Nicolás Aguilar, who has been charged in California with 19 felony counts of committing lewd acts on a child.
Aguilar worked in Los Angeles in 1987 and later served as a priest in Mexico. He disappeared after similar accusations arose against him in Mexico. The group told a news conference Tuesday that Fox never responded to its letter.
The Trumpet
Wednesday, December 7, 2005
A Vatican pronouncement on homosexuals in the priesthood has many Catholics parsing the language, looking for loopholes.
On November 29, the Vatican published its policy on homosexuality in the Roman Catholic priesthood. The document specifically forbids three groups—“those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called ‘gay culture’”—while permitting those with a “transitory problem” to serve as priests if they have overcome the tendency for three years.
In a church with a billion believers, led by a priesthood of voluntarily celibate men, this “instruction,” as it was officially called, affects a lot of people—including homosexual Catholic priests. Many prominent Catholics were thus quick to explain how the document did in fact permit homosexuality in the priesthood.
Bishop William S. Skylstad, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a statement acknowledging that the document raised the question “whether a homosexually inclined man can be a good priest.” He said yes—as long as they are dedicated servants who preach against homosexual acts. He added that “bishops and major superiors should be available to speak directly with brother priests and seminarians who personally face the problem of homosexual inclinations.” In other words, priests and seminarians with homosexual inclinations shouldn’t be expunged.
INDIANA
Courier & Press
By PHILIP ELLIOTT Courier & Press staff writer 461-0783 or elliottp@courierpress.com
December 7, 2005
The Vatican has begun its inspection of 220 U.S. seminaries for "evidence of homosexuality," and the president-rector of St. Meinrad (Ind.) School of Theology is among those doing the looking.
"It's not a witch hunt," said the Rev. Mark O'Keefe, one of the 117 Vatican-approved inspectors. "We're not supposed to go into these seminaries for a witch hunt," said O'Keefe.
He is also among the nation's senior rectors.
"The visitations," he said, "are looking at institutions, not at individuals. It's not an evaluation of any one person."
Inspectors will interview every seminarian and three years of alumni. They also will consider whether "there is a clear process for removing" dissident faculty and whether seminarians know how to use alcohol, the Internet and television "with prudence and moderation."
WICHITA (KS)
Bradenton Herald
BY STAN FINGER
The Wichita Eagle
A Wichita woman and a national advocacy group for victims of clergy sexual abuse on Tuesday delivered a letter urging the bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Wichita to remove a priest from ministry.
Peggy Warren wants the priest removed from the pulpit because, she said, he sexually assaulted her last year while he was stationed at her west Wichita parish, and she is afraid he will assault women at the two rural parishes he is now serving.
"I would not want any family to go through the hell my family has been through," Warren said outside diocesan headquarters near Central and Broadway.
In a move that leaders of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests called unprecedented, Bishop Michael Jackels held a press conference and acknowledged that Warren and the priest had been involved in an "inappropriate" relationship.
PORTLAND (OR)
Corvallis Gazette-Times
By WILLIAM McCALL
Associated press writer
PORTLAND — Attorneys for priest sex abuse victims argued in a federal court Tuesday it’s absurd for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland to claim that federal bankruptcy law can be trumped by church law.
The victims are asking U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris to rule that church buildings, land and schools could be sold by the archdiocese to settle millions of dollars in sex abuse claims, if necessary.
But the archdiocese insists that property belongs to individual parishes, and selling off churches or schools would be an unfair burden and violate church law.
Albert Kennedy, representing the victims, said the archdiocese is trying to limit its liability by raising issues of religious freedom after filing for bankruptcy protection.
“This was a voluntary act for the purely secular purpose of avoiding jury trials and avoiding liability for child sex abuse by priests,’’ Kennedy told Perris at a hearing on motions to declare the property can be used to pay bankruptcy claims.
Cincinnati (OH)
Cincinnati Enquirer
By Gerard J. Ahrens
Much has been made of the Vatican's seminary investigation and pronouncement apparently designed to purge the priesthood of homosexuals ("Catholics still conflicted over gays," Nov. 28). The stated purpose of these actions appears to be an attempt to address the horrendous scandal of sexual abuse of minors by priests.
Even if church leaders are again successful, as they have been many times throughout history, in convincing the faithful to disregard scientific truth - i.e., in this case that pedophilia and homosexuality are not necessarily related concepts - the undeniable fact will remain that this purported remedy for this abuse crisis completely ignores the fact that about 20 percent of the victims of clergy sexual molestation are female.
How can the all-male Catholic hierarchy once again so blatantly devalue and disregard the experience of women?
Perhaps a better question would be: How could we expect anything different? Even if we give the originators of this absurd "final solution" the benefit of the doubt and we do not conclude that their obliviousness to female victims simply manifests their ancient prejudicial notion of woman as blameworthy temptress, we are still left with the question: How, by any stretch of the imagination, could the elimination of homosexuals from the priesthood protect females from clergy sexual abuse?
UTAH
KUTV
A Utah Supreme Court has postponed a hearing on a lawsuit filed by two Salt Lake City men who allege they were sexually abused by a former priest.
Ralph and Charles Colosimo sued the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City and former officials from Judge Memorial Catholic High School in February 2003. They claim leaders knew Reverend James F. Rapp, a one-time teacher, was a pedophile but did nothing to stop him from abusing the brothers in the 1970s.
The Colosimo's multimillion dollar lawsuit was dismissed by both a judge and the Court of Appeals on the grounds they waited too long to file. However, the men argued they did not become aware of Rapp's history of molestation until they saw a May 2002 article about him in The Washington Post.
PORTLAND (OR)
The Cincinnati Post
From staff and wire reports
PORTLAND, Ore. - The Archdiocese of Portland, the first in the country to file for bankruptcy because of abuse settlements, is at the heart of a debate that could affect future claims by alleged victims of priest sexual abuse.
Attorneys are fighting over who, exactly, owns the churches and the land they're built on.
A hearing was scheduled for todayon whether the individual parishes and Catholic schools own their assets, as the archdiocese argues, or whether those assets belong to the archdiocese itself, as the plaintiffs claim.
Dan Andriacco, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, said Canon Law - the law of the church - is very clear on the matter.
"Canon 1256 states the right of ownership over goods under the supreme authority of the Roman Pontiff belongs to that juridic person which has lawfully acquired them," said Andriacco. "A parish is its own juridic person."
COLUMBUS (OH)
National
By BILL FROGAMENI
Columbus, Ohio
Members of the Ohio legislature heard deeply disturbing tales Nov. 22 from alleged victims testifying in favor of a state bill that would dramatically increase the statute of limitations for sexual abuse of minors. The new law, opposed by the Catholic Conference of Ohio, could have a significant effect on potential cases involving priests.
The current law allows allegations into civil court two years after the age of 18. Senate Bill 17, currently in front of the judicial committee in the Ohio House, extends the time from two years to 20. More important, say victims’ advocates, is how SB 17 creates a one-year “look back” period allowing complaints to be filed for allegations up to 35 years old. SB 17 would also strengthen mandatory reporting laws for bishops, priests, counselors, teachers and others who suspect child sexual abuse.
The bill passed the Ohio Senate unanimously last March, but has been stalled in the House judiciary committee over spirited negotiations between victims’ advocates and the Catholic Conference of Ohio (run by Ohio’s bishops), which opposes the bill.
UNITED STATES
national
By MARY GAIL FRAWLEY-O’DEA
Both the John Jay College of Criminal Justice report on the clergy sexual abuse crisis and the 2005 Report on the Implementation of the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People stated that Roman Catholic priests abused mostly males. The John Jay study, for example, found that 64 percent of the accused priests abused only males; 22.6 percent abused only females; 3.6 percent abused both girls and boys, and in 10 percent of the cases, the gender was unknown. Statistics were similar in the 2005 study.
Not only were most reported victims male, they also were pubescent; 60 percent were first abused between the ages of 10-14. These are not, however, biologically or psychosexually fully developed males and cannot be construed as homosexual partners for any adult.
Still, the gender and age of so many victims created space for Vatican officials such as Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estévez and Fr. Andrew Baker, conservative journalist Deal Hudson and others to link the sexual abuse of young people to homosexual priests. Now it appears that the Vatican, holding back on a full ban on gays in the priesthood, wants to hold homosexual priests responsible for the sexual abuse crisis.
The attack on gays by some Catholic spokesmen has drawn criticism from experts on sex offenders. Robert Geffner, psychologist and editor of the Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, stated that research indicates that homosexuals are no more likely than heterosexuals to violate minors sexually. David Finkelhor, director of Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire, views sexual attraction to minors as a separate sexual attraction, an opinion also espoused by John Bancroft, physician and director of the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction. Sexual offender researchers Nicholas Groth and Frank Oliveri studied more than 3,000 sex offenders and did not find even one homosexual man who shifted from an attraction to adult men to a desire for minors. Conversely, they found that men who were nonexclusively fixated on children, or who regressed from an attraction to adults to an interest in children, all described themselves as heterosexual and, in addition, usually were homophobic. Similarly, Minneapolis psychologist Peter Dimock concluded that most minor boys are abused by heterosexual men, some of whom are indifferent to the gender of their victims, choosing either girls or boys based on the minor’s availability and vulnerability. Perhaps more sexual predators abuse boys than once was thought but are reluctant to say so and be perceived as homosexuals.
National
To all those in positions of leadership in the Roman Catholic church who also happen to be homosexual, we offer our commiseration and sorrow that once again you have been forced to hear your sexuality, an element intrinsic to your humanity, described as an objective disorder.
This time the phrase appears in the document with the ridiculously unwieldy title: “Instruction concerning the criteria of vocational discernment regarding persons with homosexual tendencies, considering their admission to seminary and to Holy Orders.” In other words, the document on gays and seminaries.
The description is repugnant, of course, to all those in the church, gay and straight, who understand that homosexuality is, in the overwhelming number of cases, not a chosen orientation but as essential a part of one’s nature as heterosexuality is for others.
ROME
National
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
Rome
With publication of the Vatican’s long-awaited document on gay seminarians and the subsequent torrent of reaction, two questions now seem to loom as paramount: What does the document mean? How will it be enforced?
While the document has already been a media sensation, how much long-term difference it actually makes in the day-to-day practice of seminaries and religious communities may largely turn on how -- and whether -- these questions are officially resolved, for that could determine whether the ban on gays is absolute or applied on a case-by-case basis.
At the heart of the new document, officially released Nov. 29 but leaked to the Italian press agency Adista the previous week following distribution to the Italian bishops, is that men who are “actively homosexual, have deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called gay culture” cannot be ordained as priests.
IRELAND
One in Four
How is it that a Catholic Church which could find time to declare that Harry Potter is a threat to children has yet to acknowledged the existence of the Ferns report was a question posed to a meeting at All Hallows College in Dublin last night.
Organised by the Voice of the Faithful group, it was addressed by Colm O'Gorman of the One in Four charity.
"In a week that has seen the Vatican launch a detailed report on homosexuality in the priesthood," he said, "I am again left somewhat bewildered by the continuing failure of the Vatican to even comment upon the Ferns report.
"Rome has thus far failed to even acknowledge the existence of the Ferns report, the first ever internationally to find the Vatican in part responsible for clerical sexual abuse."
IRELAND
One in Four
Catholic primate Archbishop Seán Brady has said he was "appalled, very disheartened and discouraged" on reading the Ferns inquiry report. Ruadhán Mac Cormaic reports.
Speaking to The Irish Times yesterday, he said the report gave him "a new awareness of what can happen and what shouldn't have happened, and a new awareness of our duty to do our best to make sure that nothing like that should ever happen again".
Archbishop Brady was speaking at St Patrick's College in Maynooth after he presented certificates to the first group of child protection trainers to complete a course in child protection and welfare under the auspices of the Catholic Church.
The course is part of the Irish Bishops' Conference national training strategy, which was established in 2003.
IRELAND
Irish Independent
David Quinn
Religious Affairs Correspondent
THE Church's new child protection policy is topping the agenda at the latest meeting of the Catholic hierarchy in Maynooth.
The bishops are still awaiting final recognition from Rome of the policy, called Our Children Our Church and will discuss progress in gaining the required recognition.
They are also hoping to announce the name of the director of the new, revamped child protection office before the end of the month. The section of the policy still waiting for the Vatican's recognition, or 'recognitio', focuses in particular on the management of priests who have been accused of child abuse.
This does not affect the requirement to inform the civil authorities whenever such an allegation is made known. Other aspects of the policy are already being rolled out, and training in how to implement the policy is currently taking place.
IRELAND
One in Four
The Catholic Bishop of Killaloe, Dr Willie Walsh, has described the timing of the Vatican's ruling on homosexuality in the priesthood as "unhelpful".
He also said an allegation against the former bishop of Galway, Eamon Casey, appeared to be "without any reasonable foundation".
Speaking at the launch of a new website for couples preparing to marry in the Catholic Church, gettingmarried.ie, Dr Walsh said he acknowledged the hurt felt at times in the gay community in Ireland.
"Given, if you like, the dark winter of the church in Ireland that we have experienced, I suppose for us the timing of it wasn't very helpful." He said he would have preferred if the document was an overall paper "relating to canvassing for priesthood". In most respects, Dr Walsh said, the Vatican document was not demanding anything more from people of homosexual orientation than from those of heterosexual orientation.
IRELAND
Irish Independent
David Quinn
Religious Affairs Correspondent
THE allegation against Bishop Eamon Casey "looks to be without reasonable foundation", and if this turns out to be so he should not have had to stand aside from ministry, according to Bishop Willie Walsh.
He was speaking yesterday at the launch of a website for the Church marriage advisory body, Accord.
Dr Walsh said: "I would have thought the allegation against Bishop Casey looks to be without reasonable foundation. Asking him to stand down under these circumstances looks to be against natural justice."
OHIO
ABC 13
December 6, 2005 - The Oscar-nominated documentary plays for the third time in the Toledo-area in an unlikely place.
Monday night, parishioners gathered at Our Lady of Perpetual Help to view the documentary "Twist of Faith." The film profiles Tony Comes, a Toledo firefighter who says as a child, he was molested by a priest. Comes believes the venue was a great place for him to trace back his religious roots. "This was the foundation of my faith right here," he said.
PHOENIX (AZ)
East Valley Tribune
By Lawn Griffiths, Tribune
December 6, 2005
Monsignor Dale Fushek expects to face his seven accusers in separate trials and will not plea bargain any of the 10 sexual misconduct charges against him, his attorney said Monday.
"He will not plead guilty to anything," attorney Michael Manning said. "He can’t afford to do a plea agreement, even with all sorts of assurances of no time and no fines. No priest can afford to plea bargain anything like this where they feel they are innocent because, if they do, their careers are ruined."
"We’ll beat them," Manning said. "Yes, the trials will be ugly, but there is no choice. We have to try each one of them."
IRELAND
Irish Independent
David Quinn
Religious Affairs Correspondent
THE allegation against former Bishop of Galway Dr Eamonn Casey, that came to light last week, has been passed on to the diocese of Limerick for investigation.
The diocese of Arundel and Brighton in the south of England, where Dr Casey is based, confirmed last night that the Limerick diocese has been informed of the allegation.
In accordance with Church child protection guidelines, the diocese, which is led by Bishop Donal Murray, must pass on the allegation to the relevant civil authorities including the Gardai and the local health authority.
Rev Stuart Geary, spokesman for Arundel and Brighton told The Irish Independent that the allegation was originally made to the child protection office of the Bishops of England and Wales, and was then passed onto the child protection office of his diocese.
PENNSYLVANIA
Zenit
WEST CONSHOHOCKEN, Pennsylvania, DEC. 5, 2005 (Zenit.org).- The new Vatican document on the priesthood and homosexual tendencies mentions a range of conditions, from deep-seated homosexual tendencies to transitory same-sex attractions.
To learn more about the nuances of the range of homosexual tendencies and their treatment, ZENIT turned to Dr. Richard Fitzgibbons, a psychiatrist, author and contributor to the Catholic Medical Association's document "Homosexuality and Hope."
Part 2 of this interview will appear Tuesday.
Q: How would you distinguish between someone with same-sex attractions and someone with deep-seated homosexual tendencies?
Fitzgibbons: Those with deep-seated homosexual tendencies identify themselves as homosexual persons and are usually unwilling to examine their emotional conflicts that caused this tendency. Strong physical attraction is present to other men's bodies and to the masculinity of others due to profound weakness in male confidence.
PHOENIX (AZ)
KVOA
PHOENIX The attorney for Monsignor Dale Fushek (FYOO'-shek) says he expects his client to face his seven accusers in separate trials.
Attorney Michael Manning says he will not plea bargain any of the ten sexual misconduct charges against Fushek.
Manning tells the Tribune the trials "will be ugly," but there is no choice.
The 53-year-old Fushek is accused of using his "relationship of trust" to perform criminal acts against vulnerable minor and adult victims.
PENNSYLVANIA
WFMZ
Story posted on 2005-12-05 18:52:00
SOME LOCAL LEGISLATORS ARE WORRIED TONIGHT THAT MORE CASES OF SEXUAL ABUSE IN THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH ARE ON THE HORIZON.
INSTEAD OF WAITING FOR THEM TO SURFACE, SOME LAWMAKERS WANT TO FACE THEM NOW.
CARL MADONNA REPORTS.
THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IN PENNSYLVANIA MAY BE CLAIMING BANKRUPTCY.
THAT'S ONLY IF LAWMAKERS OPEN UP A ONE YEAR WINDOW FOR VICTIMS OF SEXUAL ABUSE TO FILE SUIT.
THE PENNSYLVANIA CATHOLIC CONFERENCE SAYS A ONE YEAR WINDOW WOULD FORCE AN AVALANCHE OF LAWSUITS.
PORTLAND (OR)
KGW
12/06/2005
Associated Press
In a Dec. 4 story about the Archdiocese of Portland's bankruptcy case, The Associated Press erroneously reported that a federal court in Spokane, Wash., was one of two federal courts that had sidestepped the issue of whether the diocese or parishes own properties.
In fact, the federal bankruptcy judge in the Spokane case ruled that parish and school property can be sold to pay victims of sexual abuse by priests. The ruling has been appealed.
SPRINGFIELD (MA)
The Republican
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
By BILL ZAJAC
wzajac@repub.com
SPRINGFIELD - Two brothers with clergy sexual abuse suits pending against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield said the bishop told them recently that he was unaware that alleged victims such as themselves had not been invited to settle suits when the diocese settled with 45 others for $7.7 million in August 2004.
The Most Rev. Timothy A. McDonnell, the bishop of the diocese, denied the brothers' claim, saying he simply was confused by the men's change in legal counsel, according to his spokesman.
The 2004 settlement was limited to clients of Greenfield lawyer John J. Stobierski. The outstanding suits from other lawyers' clients, new suits filed by Stobierski and claims by those not represented by lawyers are now part of complicated litigation that includes a legal fight between the diocese and its insurance carriers to determine the insurers' financial responsibility in the abuse cases.
VATICAN CITY
Reuters
Tue Dec 6, 2005 1:43 PM GMT
By Philip Pullella
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Dissident theologians opposed to the beatification of Pope John Paul have issued an appeal urging Catholics critical of the late pope to tell the Vatican if they also think he should not be made a saint.
The 11 Catholic theologians said Church officials who are reviewing John Paul's life and pontificate should also consider the "negative evaluation" liberal critics have of the nearly 27-year-old papacy that ended when John Paul died in April.
The Rome diocese has opened a beatification cause for the Pope. Church officials have asked all Catholics to come forward with personal experiences or evidence of possible miracles that could support a reputation for holiness.
In their appeal, which received wide play in major Italian newspapers on Tuesday, the theologians from Italy, Spain, Austria and Latin America said those judging the case should also take into account "negative" aspects of John Paul's papacy. ...
While the theologians acknowledged John Paul's papacy had "positive aspects", their seven-point appeal included criticism of his rigidly conservative stand on issues such as contraception, limitations on the role of women, and of scandals in the Church.
It included the sexual abuse scandal that swept the United States in 2002, when it was discovered that priests who had molested children were moved from parish to parish instead of being defrocked or turned over to authorities.
WICHITA (KS)
Wichita Eagle
A national advocacy group for victims of clergy sexual abuse plans to urge the Catholic Diocese of Wichita to remove a priest from his parish, accusing him of sexually assaulting a woman from a west Wichita parish last year.
Janet Patterson of Conway Springs, a national board member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, has scheduled a 1:15 p.m. press conference today in front of diocesan headquarters at 424 N. Broadway.
DENVER (CO)
Denver Post
By Keith Swain
Guest Commentary
Denver
As a therapist, there's no one I have more respect for than a client who understands a problem, deals with it and takes responsibility.
Sadly, it seems the Catholic Church doesn't have the same strength of character. In a weak attempt to address the problem of child sexual abuse by the clergy, the Vatican last week issued a dictum. Was it a call to action against sexual abuse of children?
No. The church has decided to blame someone else for its problem, namely gay men. The truth is the Catholic Church does not have a problem with gay men. It has a problem with sex - in particular, with pedophilia and chastity.
Sadly, sex has been a delicate subject in Catholicism, no matter that it is essential to mankind. Sex is love and excitement, soul- searching and soul-defining. It is love, literally embodied. If God is love, then sex is a conduit to the Supreme, a joining of two souls. It is as natural as breathing, as innate as a child seeking its mother's milk, and as essential to our well-being as food and water. God created sex, and saw that it was good.
UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune
A Utah Supreme Court hearing on a lawsuit filed by two Salt Lake City men who allege they were sexually abused by a former priest has been postponed until Feb. 1. Ralph and Charles Colosimo, now in their 50s and 40s respectively, sued the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City and former officials from Judge Memorial Catholic High School in February 2003. They claimed leaders knew the Rev. James F. Rapp, a one-time teacher, was a pedophile but did nothing to stop him from abusing the brothers in the 1970s. The suit is believed to be the first such filed in Utah after the sex abuse scandal hit the U.S. Catholic Church in 2002. Both the 3rd District Court and the state Court of Appeals dismissed the multimillion-dollar lawsuit on the grounds that the Colosimos had waited too long to file, and had failed to prove that their case should be an exception to those time limitations.
DENVER (CO)
Rocky Mountain News
By David Montero, Rocky Mountain News
December 6, 2005
Two more lawsuits involving allegations of sex abuse by a former priest are hitting the Archdiocese of Denver, bringing the total against Harold Robert White to 13.
The lawsuits, announced Monday by attorneys for the two men, are the 24th and 25th filed against the Catholic Church in Colorado. One of the new lawsuits involves John Koldeway, the older brother of Tom Koldeway. Both brothers accuse White of molesting them in the 1960s and early 1970s. Tom Koldeway filed his lawsuit in August.
Koldeway's mother and father - along with a cousin - gathered Monday in a downtown Denver law office to talk about their anger toward the church and how the alleged abuses damaged their family and faith.
"The bitterness stays and stays and stays," said Arthur Koldeway, the boys' father.
PORTLAND (OR)
Statesman Journal
BY WILLIAM MCCALL
The Associated Press
December 6, 2005
PORTLAND -- The Archdiocese of Portland, the first in the country to file for bankruptcy because of abuse settlements, is at the heart of a debate that could affect future claims by alleged victims of priest sex abuse.
Attorneys are fighting about who owns the churches and the property they stand on.
A hearing is scheduled today about whether the individual parishes and Catholic schools own their assets, as the archdiocese argues, or whether those assets belong to the archdiocese, as the plaintiffs say.
The case before U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris could set a precedent on whether federal law trumps Roman Catholic doctrine when it comes to church property.
If the alleged victims win their argument, the property could be made directly available to help pay for any settlements. If they lose, it could force them to go after the individual parishes, delaying and complicating the process while likely increasing the legal costs.
PENNSYLVANIA
The Morning Call
A three-year investigation by the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office revealed how two cardinals and top aides hid decades of sexual abuse in the Philadelphia Archdiocese. As in a number of other places in the United States, the district attorney's report in September showed diocese leaders put more emphasis on protecting accused priests than they did in seeking help for victims and preventing further abuse.
Victims, with guidance from the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, have sought criminal and civil recourse with varying degrees of success, depending on state statutes. But there are other invisible victims of civil suits filed against a Catholic diocese: the vast majority of priests who are innocent, their parishioners, and parochial schools and social services for the needy.
The ripple effect of large monetary settlements can be enormous, yet, an offending parish or diocese must be held accountable and victims compensated. That's why a behind-the-scenes effort to reach a compromise in Harrisburg is commendable: A bill to allow a one-year window to file suits for crimes outside the statute of limitations would not go forward. In return, the state's Catholic dioceses would put up millions of dollars for a victim compensation fund for the more than 100 victims who testified before the grand jury in Philadelphia.
IRELAND
Anarkismo
by Cover Story - WSM - Workers Solidarity Tuesday, Dec 6 2005, 11:58am
It's taken decades for the mask of evil to finally be fully exposed. The report by the inquiry into child sexual abuse by pervert priests in the Ferns diocese has at last exposed the suffering endured by huge numbers for people. Now all across the country the truth is finally being told.
One of the principal reasons why priests were able to get away with their rape and abuse of children for so long was because the state abdicated its responsibility to protect children. This is most obvious in relation to control of education.
Again and again in the Ferns report it emerges that priests were able to use their position on management authorities of primary schools to gain access to the children they abused. For example, in Monageer Fr. James Grennan abused 10 young girls during confirmation classes. Local gardai 'lost' the investigation files and this evil predator was allowed to continue to abuse children. And he was able to use his position as chair of the management board of the local primary school to gain access to his victims.
Up to 95% of primary schools in the 26-Counties are directly under the control of the Catholic church. This means that the local bishop is the patron and has an effective veto over membership of the management board. In the vast majority of cases, it means that the local parish priest is chairperson of the Board of Management.
IRELAND
Derry Journal
Tuesday 6th December 2005
A priest, who controversially spoke out about the Catholic Church sex abuse scandals in the US, addressed a Derry audience on Sunday evening in the city's Tower Hotel.
Fr. Tom Doyle spoke about the recurring sex scandals that have rocked the Church in recent years, and claimed that Derry parishioners shouldn't have to pay for the sins of their priests through the controversial Stewardship Fund.
He believes that responsibility for the abuse scandal went right to the core of the Catholic Church.
Fr. Doyle said Ireland's Stewardship Fund was "something that the bishops should be responsible for, not these good people here" and that many people believe it should be the bishops who pay the levy, not the parishioners, because they had not handled the situation correctly.
NEW JERSEY
Jersey Journal
Monday, December 05, 2005
By JASON DEL REY
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER
Even if the allegations of sexual misconduct against him are true, Monsignor Peter Cheplic can't be sued by his victims, according to a New Jersey state law that prohibits the "beneficiary" of a nonprofit organization - such as a member of a church - from suing it in court.
Such blanket immunity exists only in New Jersey, Tennessee and Alabama, and six other states have limited immunity, according to Fix The Law, a non-profit organization founded by former Bayonne resident Mark Crawford, who says he is a clergy abuse survivor.
New Jersey's law was adopted in 1958, when lawmakers rushed to enact it after the state Supreme Court abolished the centuries-old doctrine of charitable immunity. The state's Charitable Immunity Act was drafted within a week of the court decision and was enacted within three months.
In recent years, the state's Catholic bishops have defended the law, saying money donated by parishioners for charitable purposes should not be diverted to pay for lawsuits.
STAMFORD (CT)
Newsday
By JOHN CHRISTOFFERSEN
Associated Press Writer
December 5, 2005, 6:34 PM EST
STAMFORD, Conn. -- In a case that could have implications for New York Cardinal Edward Egan, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport asked the Connecticut Supreme Court on Monday to reconsider its ruling that newspapers can ask for documents related to its settlement of priest abuse cases.
The 3-2 ruling by the high court last month left it up to a lower court to decide whether to release the records. The diocese wants a full panel of seven justices or judges to consider the case.
Church officials argue the high court's decision wrongly concluded that a lower court judge agreed to allow the newspapers to intervene in the case. They say the trial court judge abused his discretion and want a new hearing on whether the papers have a right to intervene.
"The decision is, therefore, inconsistent with fundamental fairness and violates the defendants' right to due process," attorney John Farley wrote for the diocese.
Church officials also said the high court's ruling leaves intact a decision by a trial court judge who "demonstrated palpable hostility" to the church and courts by alleging they were part of an effort to cover up the abuse scandal.
PENNSYLVANIA
KDKA
Don Cannon
Reporting
(KDKA) PITTSBURGH The Roman Catholic church in the United States has paid out more than $200 million to settle lawsuits for abuse by priests.
The figure could skyrocket if Pennsylvania and other states change the statute of limitations for filing those lawsuits.
Some lawmakers in harrisburg are considering a one-year window in which victims could file a lawsuit regardless of when the abuse occurred.
“It was embarrassment, ridicule, your own self-guilt,” said Paul Dorsch, an alleged sex abouse victim.
“He would wake up from nightmares and couldn't sleep,” said Lisa Dorsch, Paul’s ex-wife. “He would break out in sweats.”
Many victims opted for silence until several years ago when Dorsch, supported by his former classmates at Quigley Catholic High School, spoke out about allegedly being sexually abused by former Quigley headmaster, Jack Hoehl.
COLORADO
Rocky Mountain News
By The Associated Press
December 5, 2005
Two more men said today they were sexually abused by a Colorado priest at least 25 years ago and they accused the Archdiocese of Denver of not doing enough to protect them.
John Koldeway of Anchorage, Alaska, and a Colorado man identified only as John Doe 1A planned to file lawsuits in Denver District Court against the archdiocese, according to drafts of the lawsuits distributed by the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.
At least one of them also planned to name the former priest as a defendant.
The lawsuits would bring to at least 25 the number of such cases filed in Colorado this year by people alleging they were sexually assaulted by former priests or a Catholic school teacher when they were children.
The draft lawsuits allege that Harold Robert White abused them in the 1960s and 1970s.
MichNews
By J. Grant Swank, Jr.
MichNews.com
Dec 5, 2005
Recent reactions to the Vatican prohibition of active homosexuals permitted in the priesthood have prompted some Catholic laity and clergy to state publicly that homosexual "cultures" in certain orders and seminaries are keeping heterosexuals from entering the ministry.
The conclusion is that there are heterosexual Catholic men who sense the divine call into the priesthood but refrain from even starting religious studies via the seminaries because they are aware that there are many active homosexuals in the seminaries or that there is an allowance for them there.
Further, there are some Catholic orders that are not growing because it is known that these orders welcome practicing homosexuals as priests. Consequently, heterosexuals stay away from those orders because of the over influence of homosexual "culture" in them.
Catholic leadership in tune with the recent Vatican statement regarding homosexuality in the priesthood is asking for there to be a hard line on the Vatican position. In other words, there can be no tolerance at all for active homosexuals in the priestly ministry.
The studies also have shown that 81 percent of sex scandals involving Catholic priests and males within the parish relate to homosexual priests. Therefore, in order to cut through such future scandals, there has to be the moral line drawn in the sand. That line has to be honored not only by Vatican officialdom but also by diocesan leadership and local priests. It is not enough for the Vatican to make the declaration; there
Malta Today
The Holy See has put its foot down on gay men in the seminary but its complex instruction does not explain whether it is sexual orientation or sexual immaturity it is concerned about. Can the Vatican get over its badly-handled investigations of the US child abuse scandals?
How grave a mission is it for the Church to fish out the gay men in the clergy? A nonchalant wave, a campy drawl, or maybe cassocked queens unhappy with their hems?
The Vatican’s recent 1,300-word instruction on the “active discernment” of candidates to the priesthood who might be gay, has presented a new dimension to the identity of the Vatican – evidently torn between its universal message of love and manifest homophobia. ...
Critics claim the instruction is misguided, a smokescreen on the real problem in the Church when it comes to sexual abuse and paedophilia. But now it seems the Church is bent on affirming time and again the heterosexuality and maleness of its shepherds, slamming its brawny arms onto the barroom table, drinking beer, talking football: not only does it want it to be an all-male changing room – it wants to keep the cissies out.
MINNESOTA
Minneapolis Star-Tribune
Pam Louwagie and Rob Hotakainen
Last update: November 17, 2005 at 11:40 PM
A University of St. Thomas law professor who once clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is the president's probable pick for a federal judgeship in Minnesota, according to a source familiar with the nomination process.
Patrick J. Schiltz, a Harvard Law School graduate, is going through FBI background checks before his name is nominated to the Senate for confirmation, the source said. A separate source on Capitol Hill said that the FBI has contacted his office to make inquiries about Schiltz and that no inquiries were made about other candidates.
Schiltz declined to comment Thursday. A spokesman for Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., said the senator's office doesn't comment on such matters. Senators of the same political party as the president typically recommend appointments for federal judgeships.
It is unclear when the background checks would be completed. The judgeship opened after U.S. District Judge Richard Kyle took senior status last spring. ...
He represented religious organizations in more than 500 clergy sex abuse cases.
He wrote articles that, while condemning clergy abuse, said recent media attention was misdirected because most cases were more than 10 years old and most Catholic dioceses had cleaned up their acts by the early 1990s.
In an article in the national Catholic weekly America, he wrote that the church had a moral obligation to compensate victims of clergy abuse fairly, but suggested it be done in an alternative system to the courtroom. When the church pays, he wrote in another article, the people who pay are the people in the pews or those whom the church serves.
CANADA
Indian Country Today
OTTAWA - Almost $2 billion in Canadian funds will be paid to aboriginal survivors of the Canadian residential school system.
The settlement was announced Nov. 23, one day before the First Ministers Meeting with national aboriginal leaders convened in Kelowna, British Columbia.
Following six months of negotiations between the Assembly of First Nations and the federal government, an agreement-in-principle was signed that has resulted in the largest and most comprehensive settlement package in Canadian history.
About 86,000 First Nations, Metis and Inuit are eligible to collect these payments, many of whom are more than 60 years old.
MASSACHUSETTS
The Massachusetts Daily Collegian
By Chris Eckel, Collegian columnist
December 05, 2005
For us here at UMass, final exams are coming up pretty soon. But never fear, to get you ready for reading your grades on SPIRE, I'm going to release my grades for the big movers and shakers this year. Let's hope nothing changes in the next month, or else Professor Eckel might have to reevaluate.
Religions - D
So the Catholic Church is leading the charge here. They've grossly misplayed the sexual abuse scandal. Instead of cleaning out their closet, they are more concerned with making priests who come out of the closet disappear. Parishioners (those who still have parishes left, at least) are becoming disgruntled, and if the Vatican continues to push away priests and parishes, then they might be able to do what 2,000 years of religious warfare couldn't: extinguish the Catholic faith.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
Philadelphia Daily News
By MADELEINE DEAN
O, wonder!...
O brave new world,
That has such people in't!
- Miranda,
in Shakespeare's "The Tempest"
PHILADELPHIA and other cities are in the midst of a tempest - a sad storm of sexual abuse of children by adults who children have a right to trust.
Two weeks ago, parents of children at St. Joseph's Preparatory School learned of the abrupt resignation of a longtime teacher.
On Nov. 9, a teacher of 29 years quit in the middle of fourth period. The students were all surprised by the teacher's midday dash - some were under the impression that he walked out in protest over disciplinary treatment of a student. But that was just a rumor.
Instead, a few days later, parents received a letter from the Prep that began: "It is with concern and sadness that I am writing to you today. Last week, Church officials received inquires concerning... incidents of alleged inappropriate [behavior by the teacher] with three students in the mid-1990s."
I make no judgment about the teacher; the facts are few and thin. And it is not for me to judge. It will be up to others to make a clear, full and truthful determination - for us and for our children.
But it is not too early to judge the actions of those in charge at St. Joe's Prep - both now and in the past. In a real way, we parents must judge them, since we employ them for our children's benefit.
PHILADELPHIA (PA)
The Ledger
The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA
Roman Catholic Church officials in Pennsylvania say a proposal to let sexual-abuse victims file lawsuits decades after they were abused would be "fundamentally unfair" and could financially ruin dioceses across the state.
Pennsylvania has a strict statute of limitations that has kept most sexual abuse cases out of the courts, but some lawmakers are now recommending a one-year window in which victims could file lawsuits regardless of when the abuse occurred.
The proposal followed a scathing report issued in September by the Philadelphia district attorney's office that documented how two cardinals and top aides hid decades of abuse allegations involving the Philadelphia Archdiocese.
In a statement Friday, the archdiocese said that permitting old allegations to enter the courts would likely expose the church and other institutions to huge damages, causing an "incalculable financial impact ... felt in every corner of Pennsylvania."
MAINE
Boston.com
By Associated Press | December 5, 2005
PORTLAND, Maine -- The Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland announced that the pastor of a church in Kennebunk is stepping down, pending an investigation into an allegation that he had improper contact with a minor six years ago.
The diocese said Saturday that the Rev. Laurent Laplante's ''temporary removal from public ministry" was for ''the purpose of preserving the integrity of the process, to give potential witnesses the greatest freedom, and to fulfill the church's commitment to protect children."
Laplante, 74, has been pastor of St. Martha's Parish in Kennebunk since 1995.
The diocese said a high school girl recently reported that when she was 9 Laplante touched her pants on the knee and inner thigh. Laplante has denied any wrongdoing and has indicated he will cooperate with the diocese in its investigation, according to the church statement.
Boston Globe
By James Carroll | December 5, 2005
LAST WEEK'S Vatican ''instruction" restricting admission to the priesthood to heterosexuals was an exploitation of prejudice about homosexuality aimed at drawing attention away from the real crisis facing the Catholic Church.
If any one group ''caused" the priest sex-abuse scandal, it was not gays, but rather the bishops themselves, who now scapegoat gays. The truly scandalous fact remains that, while a small percentage of priests abused children, the overwhelming majority of bishops knowingly protected the abusers instead of the abused. And as periodic news reports demonstrate, this pattern continues, with the uncovered secrets of deal-making, plea-bargaining, asset-protection -- and the vengeful punishing of priests who dared to challenge bishops on the issue.
What the scandal reveals is the moral bankruptcy of the entire Catholic clerical culture, but in order to deal with that, basic questions about celibacy, women's ordination, the role of the laity, and repressive authority would have to be asked. Obviously, those are questions the Vatican is desperate to deflect, and that is the purpose of this new ruling.
The instruction is the second large signal that the Vatican has no real interest in reckoning with the priest-abuse catastrophe. The first signal was in the Vatican's own reiteration of the preference of abuser over abused when it appointed Cardinal Bernard Law to the prestigious position of archpriest of Rome's Basilica of St. Mary Major. Cardinal Law, recall, not only sponsored some of the most lecherous abusers, repeatedly sending them out among the defenseless young, but he betrayed the church's own most sacred traditions when, for example, he tried to use the seal of confession as a way of protecting the secret of abuse.
PASADENA (CA)
San Gabriel Valley Tribune
By Marshall Allen Staff Writer
PASADENA - A Vatican document that says men with "deep-rooted homosexual tendencies" should be discouraged from the priesthood is causing mixed reactions among Catholic leaders.
The official church instruction was released Tuesday to provide bishops and leaders of spiritual orders and seminaries with criteria for discerning whether homosexuals should be admitted into the priesthood. It underscores the church teaching that same-sex acts are "grave sins," and says men with homosexual tendencies are to be carefully considered before being admitted to the priesthood.
Liberal Catholic groups condemned the document, titled "Instruction on the Criteria for Vocational Discernment With Regard to Persons With Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders."
Liberals say it stigmatizes gays and wrongly links them to the church's sex abuse crisis.
PORTLAND (OR)
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
By WILLIAM MCCALL
AP BUSINESS WRITER
PORTLAND, Ore. -- The first bankruptcy in the nation declared by a Roman Catholic diocese has raised a thorny question whose answer may have an enormous impact on any future claims by victims of alleged priest sex abuse - who owns the churches and the property they are standing on?
Lawyers for the victims say it's the diocese. Attorneys for the Archdiocese of Portland say it is the individual parishes and Catholic schools.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth Perris will ultimately decide who owns church property - and on Tuesday she will hear the arguments of both sides.
The case could set a precedent over whether federal law trumps Catholic doctrine when it comes to church property, according to legal scholars and some of the attorneys involved in the case.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Concord Monitor
By LAUREN R. DORGAN
Monitor staff
November 30. 2005 8:00AM
Attorneys for a 46-year-old Northfield man accused of sexually assaulting a 4-year-old girl are arguing that they should be able to privately review records of the girl's counseling sessions.
Scott Nash, a former lay leader at Tilton's Trinity Episcopal Church, is charged with digitally raping the girl and forcing her to touch him while he babysat for her. She is now 5 years old.
In court papers, Public Defender Abigail Albee argues that the girl's accounts of the alleged abuse have differed in several particulars. Any accounts she gave to her counselor may contain inconsistencies and could even prove Nash's innocence, Albee says. The possibility of the information being useful to the defense trumps the importance of doctor-patient privilege, she argues.
A hearing was held on Monday, but Judge Kathleen McGuire made no decision on the defense's motion. Another hearing is scheduled for Friday.
NEW HAMPSHIRE
Boston Globe
December 3, 2005
CONCORD, N.H. --A former youth minister at a Tilton church has pleaded guilty to molesting a 4-year-old girl and stealing nearly $1,000 from a church-sponsored food pantry.
Scott Nash, 46, will serve two to five years in prison on a sexual assault charge. He initially faced more serious crimes, but those charges were dropped as part of a deal to spare the girl from having to testify.
KENNEBUNK (ME)
Portland Press Herald
By TESS NACELEWICZ, Portland Press Herald Writer
KENNEBUNK — The pastor of St. Martha's Roman Catholic Church is stepping aside while the Diocese of Portland investigates an allegation that he improperly touched a 9-year-old girl six years ago. Bishop Richard Malone made the announcement regarding the Rev. Laurent Laplante to parishioners at Saturday afternoon Mass at the church off Route 1.
Malone said the 74-year-old priest has denied any wrongdoing, according to a statement released by the diocese. However, Laplante has agreed to "step aside temporarily" and cooperate with the diocese as it looks into the matter, Malone said.
He said the Rev. Maurice Lebel, a retired priest in the diocese, will fill in for Laplante, who has been with the parish for 10 years.
Laplante allegedly touched the girl in 1999, but she only recently reported it, according to the diocese's statement. The allegation was that "Fr. Laplante touched her pants on the knee and inner thigh," Malone said.
The diocese said it immediately reported the allegation to public authorities. Malone has also spoken to the family of the girl, now a high school student, and the diocese has offered her support and counseling, the diocese said.
FAIRBANKS (AK)
Fairbanks News-Miner
By MARY BETH SMETZER, Staff Writer
An undercurrent of excitement ran high Saturday at Immaculate Conception Church as Bishop Donald Kettler installed its new pastor, the Rev. Mirek Woznica, in a simple, straightforward ceremony at the 5:30 p.m. Mass.
"Pray that God will bless you and your new pastor in a very special way," Kettler said at the opening of the installation service.
Incense and music, packed pews and a standing-room-only crowd combined for a celebratory atmosphere. From time to time joyful applause and laughter broke through the solemnity of the ceremony in the century-old church on the banks of the Chena River.
Heads nodded, and smiles widened when Kettler formally introduced the Polish priest to church deacons, staff members, the parish council, Stephen ministers and the congregation. ...
Just six months ago, Kettler told this same congregation that its pastor, the Rev. Richard McCaffrey, had been suspended from his pastoral duties while an inquiry was conducted, a requisite part of the procedure when a cleric is accused of abuse. Three months later he read a letter to a silent congregation that McCaffrey was relieved from all priestly duties in the diocese following a diocesan investigation.
PENNSYLVANIA
Philadelphia Inquirer
By Craig R. McCoy and Angela Couloumbis
Inquirer Staff Writers
The Catholic Church in Pennsylvania is lobbying against a proposal that would allow sexual-abuse victims from decades ago to file lawsuits, saying it could cause financial ruin for the church.
Some Harrisburg lawmakers want the state to create a one-year "window" to allow victims to sue, regardless of when they were abused. This would relax a strict statute of limitations that has kept virtually all of those cases out of the courts.
Pushing for the change are victims' groups and the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office, which issued a scathing report on clergy sexual abuse in September.
On Friday afternoon, after being questioned by The Inquirer, the Philadelphia Archdiocese issued a statement supporting some proposed reforms and explaining its opposition to any change that would permit old allegations to enter the courts.
Los Angeles Timesl
IF ITS PURPOSE IS TO UNDERLINE the church's stance that homosexuality is immoral, then the Vatican's policy barring many gays from the priesthood counts as a success. But if its aims also are to stem sexual abuse and make priests more effective chaplains, as it implies, then the directive is both illogical and ill-informed.
Most of the molestation cases in the Roman Catholic Church have involved male victims. But that's a far cry from indicating that most gay priests are potential molesters.
Beyond that, the new church instructions create artificial definitions of homosexuality. The ban on gay priests extends only to those with "deep-seated" homosexual tendencies or those who support a "gay culture" in the form of movies or books. There are no such tidy lines in the world of sexuality. Even if there were, they wouldn't necessarily say anything about a man's chastity or empathy.
Focused on homosexuality rather than on sexual behavior, the instructions leave plenty of room for criticism that they are inconsistent about sexual morality. Heterosexual intercourse outside of marriage is also frowned upon by church doctrine. But there are no explicit requirements that straight men must not support the widespread culture of movies or literature that depict such behavior.
The church will also now require men with a history of gay sexual relations to show that they can obey the strictures of priesthood by remaining celibate for three years. But it does not formally outline the same requirement for straight men. (The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has had a more consistent two-year celibacy rule for both.) The document implies that gay priests cannot make good counselors because they are less able to form "correct relationships" with men and women. That's a slur to the many gay priests who have offered heartfelt help to their parishioners.
COLUMBIA (SC)
Myrtle Beach Sun
By Christina Lee Knauss
Knight Ridder
COLUMBIA - Officials of the Catholic Diocese of Charleston say last week's Vatican statement banning gay men from the priesthood will not hurt the local church's ability to attract new priests or fill shortages.
The new Vatican instruction bans most gay men from joining the Roman Catholic priesthood or leading the seminaries that train future Catholic priests.
Steven Gajdosik, spokesman for the Diocese of Charleston, said the church has seen growth in the priesthood.
"Across the board, in this country, vocations are on the upswing since 2003, making up for the declining numbers that we saw during the '70s and '80s," he said.
Gajdosik acknowledged the slight increases are not enough to offset the number of older priests who die or retire each year in the United States. But, he said, it's a start.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston Globe
By Eileen McNamara, Globe Columnist | December 4, 2005
Where is the long-awaited Vatican policy that would protect women and girls from priests who cannot control their ''heterosexual tendencies?"
Where is the plan to evaluate every heterosexual seminarian to ''assure that the candidate does not have sexual disorders that are incompatible with priesthood?"
Where is theAbuse Tracker Conference of Bishops' Un-Holy Activities Committee to ensure that no man is ordained a Roman Catholic priest who has not ''clearly overcome" anything more than a ''transitory" sexual interest in the opposite sex?
Where, in short, are the witch hunters for the girls' team?
The Vatican directive issued last week that would ban most gay men from the priesthood has been widely interpreted as Rome's response to the worldwide clergy sex abuse scandal that has left especially deep scars on the Archdiocese of Boston. Can that be right?
CALIFORNIA
Inside Bay Area
By Angela Hill and Lea Blevins, STAFF WRITERS
If a potential Catholic priest is free from the sins of the flesh, it shouldn't matter if the man is gay or straight, several East Bay Catholics said in response to the Vatican's latest policy declaration on gays in the priesthood.
"It's a superfluous comment," said Cecilia McKee, 38, of Berkeley, referring to Tuesday's official statement from the Vatican that the church "cannot admit to the seminary ... those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called 'gay culture.'"
"In my mind, priests are asexual anyway," she said. "You can't be gay, but you also can't be heterosexual. You're not supposed to be having sex. So it doesn't matter which way your desires go. The point is whether or not you act on them."
Those in the Valley are expressing similar reactions.
EULESS (TX)
KVUE
03:06 PM CST on Saturday, December 3, 2005
Associated Press
EULESS, Texas — Police say a 68-year-old pastor has been arrested for allegedly molesting a 21-year-old man.
The Reverend James Leonard Finley, senior pastor of First United Methodist Church of Euless, was arrested Thursday. Authorities say he fondled the alleged victim against the man's wishes while he was home alone.
Police say the man was left crying in the apartment he shares with his mother. He immediately called police.
Authorities later recorded Finley offering to perform sex acts on the man.
Euless Detetive Kimberly Althouse says Finley had previously given money to the alleged victim's family to help them with bills.
IRELAND
The Sunday Times
‘Young people of Ireland, I love you,” called out Pope John Paul II to the hundreds of thousands who had gathered in Galway in October 1979. The crowd at Ballybrit racecourse responded effusively, singing and cheering. It was a glorious moment for the man who had made it all happen: Bishop Eamon Casey.
Standing in the rain for hours waiting for the Pope’s helicopter to appear through the clouds, the young people had been entertained by two of the country’s best-known clerics. The ebullient Casey, bishop of Galway, and Fr Michael Cleary, the singing priest, whipped the crowd up into an ecumenical frenzy with jubilant song and prayer.
On that October day, Casey and Cleary were only the support act, but in the early 1990s they would upstage and eclipse the entire Catholic Church in Ireland. The revelation that both had fathered children precipitated a crisis in the church from which it has never fully recovered.
In 1992, after Annie Murphy, an American divorcee, revealed the details of her affair with Casey and the existence of their son, Peter, the bishop resigned from his post and fled Ireland. Although he has returned intermittently, the church seems happier for him to stay away. It is his very ebullience, which proved so invaluable on that wet October day, that it fears.
The Times
Imagine the Pioneer Total Abstinence Association announcing that, from now on, it would only be accepting members who didn’t drink wine. Those who didn’t drink spirits, on the other hand, would not be welcome. And those would-be pioneers who mostly didn’t drink wine but occasionally didn’t drink spirits would have to prove it had been three years since they’d even thought about not drinking a Bacardi Breezer.
This, in effect, is what the Vatican has said about homosexuals and the priesthood. All priests are required to be celibate. So why is the Pope issuing instructions about the precise nature of the intimate relations from which potential clergymen must undertake to abstain? Either they’re willing to pack it all in or they’re not, and if they are, then it shouldn’t matter what their practices or tendencies or preferences used to be. If they’re not, then their being homosexual is no greater threat to the integrity of the Catholic church than if they were perfectly mature heterosexual sadomasochists. In fact, it would probably be less so, since the evidence from several residential institutions suggests that the worst sex abusers appeared to take particular pleasure in inflicting pain and humiliation on their helpless victims.
All homosexuals are not paedophiles and all paedophiles are not homosexuals.
NEW JERSEY
The Times
Friday, December 02, 2005
By LINDA STEIN
Staff Writer
A Roman Catholic priest accused of molesting an 11-year-old girl turned himself in yesterday and, after a brief appearance before a Superior Court judge, was released on his own recognizance.
The Rev. James Selvaraj, 46, the adjunct priest of St. Raphael-Holy Angels Parish in Hamilton, is charged with one count of endangering the welfare of a child for an alleged incident Sept. 28 on the church grounds, said Assistant Prosecutor Robin Scheiner, head of the sexual assault and child abuse unit.
Scheiner told Judge Maria Sypek that she had discussed the case with Selvaraj's defense lawyer, Mark Fliedner, and they agreed that Selvaraj would not be required to post bail but must submit to a series of conditions.
NEW JERSEY
NBC 10
POSTED: 4:16 pm EST December 2, 2005
UPDATED: 7:27 pm EST December 2, 2005
HAMILTON TOWNSHIP, N.J. -- A Roman Catholic priest in New Jersey was arrested Thursday and accused of molesting an 11-year-old girl in his parish.
The Mercer County prosecutor's office said that the Rev. James Selvaraj, 46, an adjunct priest of St. Raphael-Holy Angels Parish, has been charged with one count of endangering the welfare of a child in connection with an incident on Sept. 28.
Selvaraj is a priest of the Diocese of Tuticorin, India, and has been working for the Diocese of Trenton since 1998. He had been at St. Raphael's for more than one year.
"It's scary. My wife's starting to get really upset," said Bob Adams, a Hamilton Township resident who has children in the church's school. "(My wife) doesn't want to take (our children) out because it is only one incident, one priest."
Prosecutors would not go into specifics about the allegations.
"I really, deep down, believe it's a misinterpretation, miscommunication, perception -- whatever you want to call it -- but it just doesn't sound like Father James," said John Celinski, of Hamilton Township.
TRENTON (NJ)
The Trentonian
PETE DALY, Staff Writer 12/02/2005
TRENTON -- A 46-year-old priest from India who had ministered at St. Raphael-Holy Angels Parish was charged with endangering the welfare of a child yesterday.
Rev. James Selvaraj was barely audible as he entered a not guilty plea before Mercer County Superior Court Judge Maria Sypek and said he understood the single count against him.
Selvaraj engaged in conduct "which impaired or debauched the morals of an 11-year-old female" at the Hamilton Township parish on Sept. 28 of this year, according to the prosecutor’s office.
The priest was released on his own recognizance after the hearing, but Sypek ordered he surrender his passport and said he could not leave the state without a court order.
Selvaraj, who served as a priest in the Diocese of Tuticorin, India before arriving in Trenton, was also removed from his duties by the Diocese of Trenton yesterday.
FARGO (ND)
The Manila Times
FARGO, North Dakota: The Cass County prosecutor said he will continue to seek the return of a man dismissed from the priesthood after leaving the country.
Fernando Sayasaya, believed to be in the Philippines, is accused of fondling two boys in the mid 1990s, when he served parishes in Fargo and West Fargo. He is charged with gross sexual imposition in Cass County.
The Fargo Roman Catholic Diocese said Thursday that the Vatican recently dismissed Sayasaya as a priest. The Fargo diocese had relieved him of his duties in August 1998, when the allegations involving juveniles first surfaced.
Cass County State’s Attorney Birch Burdick said authorities are still working to return Sayasaya to North Dakota to face charges. He said he had been notified of the church’s action.
IRELAND
Irish Examiner
Our government didn’t give a damn, but Eamon Casey made a name for himself, as a young priest, helping those people. This was forgotten, however, because of his human failings.
Sure, as the saying goes, it could happen to a bishop. One pope died in bed with his mistress, and another not only had a son, but also arranged for the son to succeed him. In more recent times, Cardinal Cody of Chicago died while under criminal indictment as a result of his long-term involvement with a woman, and Cardinal Jean Danielou died on the stairs of a Paris brothel as he was going to visit a young prostitute.
Some of those who knew the cardinal argued that the visit was just part of his priestly duties. “The press aired all the expected innuendoes,” according to the British Dominican Timothy Radcliffe. “But, as far as I could see, he was a holy man being a good priest. In a way it was the perfect place for a cardinal to die.”
Wow!
In many respects the Casey affair opened this country up to a healthy scepticism and ultimately helped to undermine the temporal power of the Church here. Only a few years earlier, for instance, the Catholic hierarchy had played a leading role in persuading people to reject constitutional change that would have provided for divorce.
Centre Daily
BY ELLEN GOODMAN
ellengoodman@globe.com
Somewhere along the way, the dividing line over gay issues picked up and moved. It's no longer between red and blue states, or left and right wings, but between nature and nurture. Or to be more precise, between those who believe that homosexuality is a choice and those who believe that homosexuality is innate.
Remember the moment in the 2004 debate when CBS' Bob Schieffer asked President Bush and Sen. John Kerry whether they thought that homosexuality was a choice? The president answered, ''I don't know,'' and the senator replied, ``We're all God's children.''
Well, it turns out that the more you believe homosexuality is innate, the more accepting you are of gay rights. A full 79 percent of people who think that human beings are born with a sexual orientation support gay rights, including civil unions or marriage equality.
But only 22 percent of those who believe homosexuality is a choice agree. ...
Thirty years ago the Catholic Church accepted the view that some were definitively gay. Church teachings said that ''they do not choose their homosexual condition.'' Nevertheless, the new document doesn't just ban gays who ''practice'' homosexuality, breaking the vows of celibacy. It bans all those with homosexual ``tendencies.''
In the strange new backsliding language of the Vatican, homosexuality is a ''tendency.'' The church doesn't define tendency, nor does it say whether such a tendency is biological. Voluntary or not, it marks a man permanently. As Matt Foreman, a gay activist raised Catholic, says, ``Doesn't matter what you do or believe or practice. If you are gay, there is no making that better in the eyes of the church.''
DOGWOOD CITY (TX)
Tyler Morning Telegraph
By: KENNETH DEAN, Staff Writer
12/02/2005
The former Dogwood City day care owner indicted earlier this year on two counts of aggravated sexual assault of a child charges was arrested Friday morning after another victim came forward.
Jefferson Marion Moore, 57, was taken into police custody after a lengthy investigation into allegations of sexual abuse of another child in the center's care.
Lt. Larry Wiginton, Smith County Sheriff's Department, said Moore was arrested Friday morning on another charge of aggravated sexual assault of a child.
Moore is listed as the owner of the Dogwood City Preschool and Daycare, 22284 Texas Highway 155 South, which has been closed since the investigation began last December. ...
As part of his conditions of the May bond, Moore was to have no contact with children and was forced to shut down his church in July because youngsters attended. He requested that he be allowed to resume his duties as the sole pastor of the church, which has no Sunday school classes or nursery.
Judge Kerry Russell of the 7th District Court modified the conditions of his release in August, allowing Moore to continue as pastor of the Dogwood City Chapel as long as he has no contact with children unless two other adults are present.
Wisconsin State Journal
00:00 am 12/03/05
Columnist Bill Wineke
T here is a crisis in the Roman Catholic Church, but it's not a crisis caused by homosexuals or, even, by pedophiles.
The crisis stems from a central tenet of the faith, that there is a sacred priesthood, one called by God and set apart from other mere mortals.
This week, in order to explicate its definition of Holy Orders, the church issued a statement limiting ordination of gay men to those who do not have "deep-seated homosexual tendencies."
Although the statement was portrayed around the world as a means of dealing the with sexual-abuse crisis in the church, the Vatican statement makes clear that its problem with gay priests is that they do not adequately reflect the perfection of Christ.
HAWAII
The Garden Island
Cynthia Kaneshiro - The Garden Island
LIHU'E — Members of the media from around the state converged on the new Kaua'i courthouse facility to cover the arraignment of former Kalaheo resident Eugene Saulibio, charged with four counts of sexual assault involving a young girl at Saulibio's Kalaheo home in 1996.
He pleaded not guilty.
Saulibio, 44, now living in 'Aiea on O'ahu, appeared yesterday before Fifth Circuit Court Chief Judge George Masuoka, to be arraigned on the felony offenses.
Saulibio's attorney, Victor J. Bakke, requested that bail be reduced from $80,000 to $40,000.
Bakke said the present bail is a hardship on his client.
Masuoka ordered a bail study be conducted, to see if Saulibio's bail could be lowered. He remains free on bail. A jury trial is scheduled for Feb. 27.
Mercury News
By Alan Cooperman
Washington Post
During his long reign, Pope John Paul II apologized to Muslims for the Crusades, to Jews for anti-Semitism, to Orthodox Christians for the sacking of Constantinople, to Italians for the Vatican's associations with the Mafia and to scientists for the persecution of Galileo.
He apologized so often, in fact, that an Italian journalist compiled a book of more than 90 papal statements of contrition.
Yet the pope never apologized for the most shocking behavior that came to light on his watch: sexual abuse of children by priests and the church's attempts to hush it up. To some victims, that is a puzzling omission and a deep stain on his legacy.
FARGO (ND)
Grank Forks Herald
The Cass County prosecutor says he will continue to seek the return of a man dismissed from the priesthood after leaving the country.
Fernando Sayasaya, believed to be in the Philippines, is accused of fondling two boys in the mid 1990s, when he served parishes in Fargo and West Fargo. He is charged with gross sexual imposition in Cass County.
The Fargo Roman Catholic Diocese said Thursday the Vatican recently dismissed Sayasaya as a priest. The Fargo diocese had relieved him of his duties in August 1998, when the allegations involving juveniles first surfaced.
Cass County State's Attorney Birch Burdick said authorities are still working to return Sayasaya to North Dakota to face charges. He said he had been notified of the church's action.
EMMITSBURG (MD)
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
By KEVIN ECKSTROM
Religion News Service
EMMITSBURG, Md. - EMMITSBURG, Md. -- When Joe Yokum considered a call to the Catholic priesthood five years ago, the first thing a seminary official asked him was not his understanding of the Trinity or salvation, or even why he wanted to be a priest.
"Do you consider yourself to be a homosexual man?" recalled Yokum, now 27 and a third-year seminarian at Mount St. Mary's Seminary here. Jarred by the question, Yokum answered no.
"He wanted to know right away," Yokum said of the questioner.
If Yokum had answered yes, he probably would have been denied admission -- even before Tuesday's release of new Vatican rules that are designed to keep men with "deep-seated homosexual tendencies" from becoming priests.
COLORADO
The Coloradoan
By SARA REED
SaraReed@coloradoan.com
A former parishioner of a priest accused of sexual assault says she observed him behaving inappropriately with a preteen girl on Christmas Eve 2002.
The Rev. Timothy Joseph Evans, 43, faces two counts of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust, one count of sexual assault on a child - pattern of abuse and one count of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, all felonies. Evans was a priest at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, 5450 S. Lemay Ave., from 1998 to 2002.
"Jokingly, he sat her on her lap, put his arm around her and asked 'How's it going, sexy?' " said Diane Brennan, who left the church in May. "It was not overt abuse but covert, inappropriate behavior."
The incident raised a red flag, Brennan said, but she did not report it to the Rev. Larry Christensen until several months later when another parishioner mentioned witnessing a similar incident.
MEXICO
PRNewswire
MEXICO CITY, Dec. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- Clergy molestation victims are asking
Mexican President Vicente Fox to investigate clergy sex abuse cases and take
steps to protect children from a predatory priest who molested dozens of kids
in California in Mexico and help heal those already wounded by the crimes.
Yesterday, leaders of a national support group called SNAP, the Survivors
Network of those Abused by Priests, picketed and outside the Mexican consulate
in Los Angeles and hand-delivered a letter to Mexican officials urging
President Fox to investigate and explain why Fr. Nicolas Aguilar, has not
been prosecuted, seek further evidence and explore addition legal approaches
to prosecution, and publicly reach out to victims/witnesses and urge them to
contact criminal authorities.
Last week, a young Mexico City man who was allegedly sexually abused by
Aguilar, in 1996 contacted Los Angeles SNAP leaders seeking personal help and
safeguards for kids in Mexico. In response, SNAP leaders are going to Mexico
City this week, Dec. 4-7, to offer support and reach out to others victims
still suffering in guilt, shame and silence. A SNAP Mexico toll free phone
number will soon be set-up for victims and witnesses to call for help and
support (1-888-SNAP-SSOS or 1-888-762-7767).
Yahoo! News
By William F. Buckley Jr.
Fri Dec 2, 6:43 PM ET
The Vatican ruling on homosexuals in the seminaries is interesting to other than gay-rights hawks. Catholics are at liberty to say that it is not the business of non-Catholics to probe such matters. But they will be speaking mostly to themselves, because the Vatican ruling touches on questions of universal concern.
The ruling against homosexuals in the seminaries isn't on the order of Catholics will not eat meat on Fridays. The ruling isn't limited to disciplinary matters that are indeed only for Catholics to concern themselves with. When one observer pointed out that seminarians also have rights, he invoked a cultural reality, which is that the practices of Catholic clerics cannot be ignored by pleading the isolation of the Catholic vocation. The question primarily addressed has to do with the predisposition to homosexuality, a subject in which everyone is interested.
The Vatican letter says that the church respects homosexuals, but that it "cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practice homosexuality, present deeply rooted homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called gay culture."
Toledo Blade
THE Vatican directive issued recently barring gays from the priesthood was an apparent attempt to address the scourge of the sexual abuse scandal that has shamed the church. But in many respects it was a cop-out.
If the document, begun years ago by Pope John Paul II, is held up as a way to "purify" the church, as Benedict XVI suggests, the focus of the church's "purification" efforts are misdirected.
The alleged and admitted sexual abuse by clerics at parishes throughout the country and around the world was perpetrated by pedophiles - not homosexuals - who preyed on trusting children. What made the abomination worse was the tendency of the church hierarchy to, in many cases, overlook the sins of the Fathers and allow them to continue in parish ministries.
San Francisco Chronicle
Alan Cooperman, Washington Post
Friday, December 2, 2005
In a letter accompanying its directive against the ordination of men with "deep-seated homosexual tendencies," the Vatican has told bishops that gay priests should not teach in Roman Catholic seminaries.
The Rev. Donald Cozzens, a Catholic author and former seminary rector, called the letter a "bombshell" because it affects current priests, not just future ones.
Some experts on church law said Thursday that the letter was nonbinding and could simply be ignored by bishops. But others predicted it would usher in a gradual purge of gays from leadership positions in the church, even if they kept their vows of celibacy.
Because priests who teach in seminaries are frequently transferred to serve in parishes and vice versa, "it could be implemented gradually, without anybody knowing" for certain why a clergyman was moved, said Sister Katarina Schuth, a professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota who is a leading researcher on Catholic seminaries.
MENDHAM (NJ)
Obverser-Tribune
By MARIA VOGEL-SHORT Staff Writer
12/01/2005
MENDHAM — Virginia resident Mark Serrano, a former graduate of Mendham High School, said Monday there is a public safety crisis for abused children who must come out of the darkness into the light.
Serrano is a survivor of child sexual abuse who has become nationally known for his advocacy of abuse prevention.
He received the Voice of Courage award on Tuesday, Nov. 22, for speaking out. He was one of seven recipients who were honored for having spoken out about their own abuse.
The award was given by the South Carolina-based Darkness to Light organization, which is dedicated to protecting children and preventing abuse.
“Parents have to take it upon themselves to prevent abuse,” said Serrano, a former resident of Mendham. “This award validates the importance of speaking out and encourages others who have been abused to come and go forward, because it’s the right thing to do.”
Serrano, 41, broke a confidentiality agreement with the Paterson Diocese and the Catholic Church in 2002 when he publicly talked about how he had been sexually abused by James T. Hanley, a former priest at St. Joseph Church in Mendham.
After settling a civil lawsuit against James T. Hanley, Serrano spoke on national television about the abuse he received from the priest that began when he was 9 years old.
TRENTON (NJ)
The Times
Friday, December 02, 2005
By KRYSTAL KNAPP
Staff Writer
TRENTON - John Hardwicke goes to bed every night wondering whether the next morning will bring with it "the decision."
Whenever his phone rings, he picks up the receiver thinking maybe the caller is one of his lawyers bringing him the good or bad news.
It was a year ago this week that Hardwicke's lawyers argued his case against the American Boychoir School in front of the state Supreme Court.
But so far no decision has been announced, making Hardwicke v. the American Boychoir School the oldest case on which the court has yet to rule after hearing oral arguments, according to court records.
Hardwicke, 48, a former Boychoir student who alleges he was repeatedly molested at the school, has been fighting for the right to sue the school the past five years. ...
The New Jersey Catholic Conference (NJCC), the lobbying arm of the state's Catholic bishops, initially tried to kill the bill altogether.
But after seeing the overwhelming support in the Senate, the NJCC changed its position and urged lawmakers instead to set time limits on how far back the legislation would apply retroactively.
Under an NJCC proposal, the church and other nonprofit institutions would still be shielded from civil lawsuits for acts of child sex abuse committed by their employees before Sept. 24, 1992, the date New Jersey's Child Sex Abuse Act went into effect.
LOS ANGELES (CA)
Los Angeles Lay Catholic Mission
BY CHRISTOPHER ZEHNDER
The Los Angeles archdiocese has called it "full disclosure and transparency," but critics call it kicking up more dust.
On October 11, as part of settlement talks with lawyers of alleged victims of sexual molestation by priests, the archdiocese released an "Addendum to the Report to the People of God." The first "Report," issued in 2004, contained the names of 211 archdiocesan, religious, or visiting priests that have been accused of sexual molestation of minors. The "Addendum" adds to that number 26 priests that "have come to our attention" since the report was filed. Both the "Report" and the "Addendum" do not list about 30 priests who have been accused but against whom no one has filed suit; the archdiocese, too, says it has not found the accusations against these priests credible.
But the archdiocese's alleged dust kicking is not so much the release of the 26 new names but the addendum's offering of details from the personnel files of 126 priests and lay employees who are the subjects of lawsuits currently filed against the archdiocese. These offerings are really nothing more than sketch-like summaries of information from the files. Mary Grant of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests is among the critics of what she calls a "public relations ploy" on the part of Cardinal Roger Mahony and the archdiocese. "It's a very watered down, sanitized version of what is in the priests' personnel files," she told me in late October, "and some of the most important information -- which church officials were receiving the reports and what they did with them -- is covered up in this report."
BOSTON (MA)
The Daily Free Press
By Matt Negrin
Published: Friday, December 2, 2005
A pair of 20-year old twins are suing their father, Boston University professor Rev. Lucien Richard, for not acknowledging them as his children, negligence and sexual abuse, physically and emotionally, according to the complaint.
The defendant works in the University Professors Program and also serves as a priest in the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in Lowell.
The lawsuit was filed in the Middlesex Superior Court Nov.14, the daughters' attorney Alan Cantor said.
Cantor said the expected end date for the case is Jan. 8, 2007.
"This is known as a one-year case under our time standards order," he said. "Some cases are one-year cases. Some cases are three-year cases. This is generally a one-year case."
According to the complaint filed by the daughters, "in or about 1978, defendant Rev. Richard initiated a sexual affair with Paulette Peterson," which resulted in an aborted pregnancy in 1980 and another pregnancy in 1984 in which Peterson gave birth to twin girls.
By Joe Feuerherd
National
A 245-page study meant to help diocesan leaders respond to victims of clergy sex abuse has not been made publicly available, and it was unclear at press time how many bishops have seen it, though the report was provided by the author to the bishops' Washington-based Office of Child and Youth Protection in early August.
An executive summary of the study was finally posted in plain view on the bishops' Web site Nov. 30, a day after NCR first inquired about the status of the report.
PEORIA (IL)
Lincoln Courier
FROM STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
PEORIA - Defrocked monsignor Norman Goodman and the Rev. Louis Condon - who served Catholic ministries in Lincoln - are two of five priests and a nun in the Peoria Catholic Diocese accused of sexual abuse in nine civil lawsuits filed Wednesday.
Goodman is accused by Daniel Williams and Donald Schroyer, both 40, for alleged assaults between 1975 and 1979 when they were 10 to 15 years old and members of Holy Family Catholic Church, 316 S. Logan St.
The lawsuit also alleges Goodman and Condon sexually assaulted Mary Krusz, now 55.
Krusz alleges she was assaulted by Condon between 1958 and 1960 when she was 6 to 9 years old and a student at St. Mary's Catholic School in Lincoln. Krusz also claims Goodman continued the assaults from 1961 to 1974 while she was a member of St. Patrick's Catholic Church, which later changed its name to Holy Family.
IRELAND
Galway Advertiser
BY UNA SINNOTT
An allegation levelled against former bishop of Galway Dr Eamon Casey this week was originally made several years ago, it has emerged.
Dr Casey, who is understood to be preparing to travel to Ireland to contest the allegation, withdrew from public ministry last weekend after the allegation came to light and a brief statement was read out on Sunday in the Our Lady of Fatima Church in Staplefield, West Sussex, where he has been serving as a priest for the past seven years.
According to Fr Stuart Geary, communications officer for the Diocese of Arundel and Brighton, the allegation dated back many years and originated from a Catholic child protection officer in Ireland.
However it is unclear whether the allegation was made in Galway, where Dr Casey served as bishop from 1976 until his sensational departure in 1992, or in another part of the country.
IRELAND
The Kerryman
The Court of Criminal Appeal has heard that a witness deliberately gave false evidence in the rape trial of Nora Wall because she "wanted to get back at" the former nun.
Ms Wall is currently seeking to have her case declared a miscarriage of justice.
The 56-year-old was sentenced to life in prison in 1999 after being convicted of helping a homeless man to rape a nine-year-old girl who was under her care 10 years previously.
The former administrator at St Michael's Child Care Centre in Cappoquin, Co Waterford, later had her conviction overturned due to errors in the trial and the fact that certain evidence had not been disclosed.
IRELAND
IOL
01/12/2005 - 14:50:21
A young woman gave false evidence against a former nun because she hated her and wanted to get back at her, a court heard today.
Nora Wall, 57, is seeking a certificate declaring a miscarriage of justice after she was wrongfully convicted of the rape of a young girl in 1999.
At the Court of Criminal Appeal, senior counsel, John Rogers, said that there had been a significant amount of new material discovered since that trial, particularly the statement made to garda in April 2001 by Patricia Phelan.
This 32-year-old woman had lived at the St Michael’s child care centre in Capp, County Watford, with Regina Walsh, the young woman who complained to gardaí that she had been held down there on an unknown date in 1987 or 1988 by Sister Dominic (Nora Wall) and raped by a homeless man, Pablo McCabe.
IRELAND
Irish Examiner
THE vindication of a former nun, wrongly sentenced to life imprisonment for the rape of a young girl that never happened, deserves to be loudly applauded.
Unfortunately, while certain members of religious orders were undoubtedly guilty of abusing those entrusted to their care, the majority were tarred unfairly with the same brush even though many were completely innocent of such charges.
Thankfully, the 1999 conviction of Nora Wall on false evidence for attacking a girl at St Michael’s Childcare Centre in Cappoquin, Co Waterford, in the late 1980s, was quashed within days after it emerged a witness at the trial had been called contrary to a direction from the DPP. After enduring untold suffering, Ms Wall will derive deep solace from yesterday’s ruling of Justice Nicholas Kearns, who found the rape conviction was a miscarriage of justice.
IRELAND
Waterford News & Star
By Jennifer Long
FORMER nun Nora Wall is to apply to the Court of Criminal Appeal this Thursday for a certificate declaring she was the victim of a miscarriage of justice in relation to her conviction for rape six years ago.
If the certificate is approved, it will pave the way for the former Cappoquinbased ex-Mercy sister to sue the State in relation to the incident.
Nora Wall sensationally became the first woman in the history of the State to be found guilty of rape and the first person generally to receive a life sentence for the offence.
However, after just four days the convictions was quashed when it emerged that a key prosecution witness had given evidence despite clear instruction from the Director of Public Prosecutions that she did not do so. A number of other errors also emerged. The DPP did not seek a retrial.
IRELAND
Belfast Telegraph
By Michael Brennan
02 December 2005
A former nun who was sentenced to life imprisonment for the rape of a young girl was yesterday declared the victim of a miscarriage of justice.
Nora Wall (57) was convicted in 1999 along with a homeless man of the attack on the girl at St Michael's Childcare Centre in Cappoquin, Co Waterford on an unknown date in 1987 or 1988.
But the conviction was quashed days after the verdict after it emerged that a witness at the trial had been called contrary to the Director of Public Prosecution's direction.
At the Court of Criminal Appeal yesterday, Justice Nicholas Kearns, presiding, said Ms Wall should not have to wait a minute longer for the verdict.
"The court is quite satisfied there are newly discovered facts which show there has been a miscarriage of justice in this case," he said.
IRELAND
Irish Independent
Ann O Loughlin
FORMER nun Nora Wall, who was wrongfully convicted of raping a 10-year old girl, was the victim of a miscarriage of justice.
The Court of Criminal Appeal yesterday certified that there had been a miscarriage of justice in the case of Ms Wall, formerly Sr Dominic, who was sentenced to life imprisonment six years ago.
Mr Justice Nicky Kearns, presiding, after hearing the four-hour-long application, said the three-judge court believed Ms Wall "should not have to wait a moment longer than necessary" to hear the court's decision.
Crucial
The judge said newly discovered facts in the case included a crucial trial witness, Ms Patricia Phelan, who admitted to gardai and another nun that she had lied about having witnessed Ms Wall hold down a young girl while a man raped her.
Immediately after the court's decision, Ms Wall, with her hand outstretched, approached Ms Phelan. A tearful Ms Phelan threw her arms around Ms Wall and hugged her.
Earlier the court heard that the DPP accepted that, had he been aware, prior to the arrest and prosecution in the late 1990s of Ms Wall and the late Paul (Pablo) McCabe, of significant information which had since come to light, the prosecution could and would never have been brought.
BOSTON (MA)
Boston Herald
By Marie Szaniszlo
Friday, December 2, 2005 - Updated: 12:32 AM EST
Women who had been abused by priests as children demonstrated outside the Archdiocese of Boston’s headquarters yesterday, saying the Vatican’s new policy barring gay men from the seminary will do nothing to prevent the kind of abuse they endured.
“Perhaps the public . . . would like to think that priests abused altar boys and somehow their daughters were safe,” said Ann Hagan Webb, a psychologist who was abused by a priest from the time she was in kindergarten through seventh grade. “We were not safe. And the sexual orientation of our abusers had nothing to do with it.”
Webb was referring to a document the Vatican released earlier this week saying men “who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called ‘gay culture’ ” cannot be admitted to seminaries. The policy had been in the works for years, but came to light in 2002 at the height of the clergy sex abuse scandal.
Kathleen M. Dwyer, who was abused by a priest from the ages of 5 to 8, accused church leaders of scapegoating gays to avoid taking responsibility for the scandal and to further the church’s agenda of banning same-sex marriages. Dwyer was among more than a dozen women at the demonstration.
ALBANY (NY)
Troy Record
Robert Cristo, The Record 12/02/2005
ALBANY - Former Christian Brothers Academy teacher Beth Geisel registered as a sex offender Thursday after recently pleading guilty to having numerous sexual encounters with an underage boy.
Geisel, 42, was back in Albany County Court to register as a level 1 sex offender, which is a category given to defendants considered the least likely to re-offend.
She was sentenced to six months behind bars last month, despite the judge in the case stating her underage male victim wasn't totally innocent in the salacious scandal that drew national attention.
The Tablet
Editorial
IT IS NOT EASY to understand how the Vatican could issue an Instruction on homosexuality and the priesthood, long in preparation and much discussed and revised, that is still open to widely differing interpretations. The key passage declares that “the Church, while profoundly respecting the persons in question, cannot admit to the seminary or to Holy Orders those who practise homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called ‘gay culture’”. Most people would read the key phrase “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” – which also appears in the Catholic Catechism – as another way of saying “homosexual orientation”. This seems to be borne out by such semi-official commentaries as have emerged from Rome. Yet Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor of Westminster promptly issued a statement that insisted: “The Instruction is not saying that men of homosexual orientation are not welcome in the priesthood.”
There is little room for disagreement with the Vatican document’s assertion that those who engage in homosexual acts are disqualified from the priesthood, though it might have been better to make it clear that for a celibate priesthood this applies to heterosexual acts as well. Equally uncontentious is its opposition to what Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor describes as “an eroticised gay culture” inside seminaries. But what of candidates for the priesthood who are proving successful in their embrace of celibacy, but who know themselves to be gay? Indeed, what of priests perhaps years into a productive and holy ministry, who also know that about themselves? It is hard to escape the conclusion that the Vatican document must have been profoundly wounding to them – nor that the cardinal has done his best to mitigate that deep hurt.
UNITED KINGDOM
Response Source
London: In the season of Advent and in the run up to Christmas, the Catholic Action Group (C.A.G.) in response to the growing number of proven sexual abuse charges being landed against clergy under the control of the Hierarchy of the Catholic Church in the United Kingdom and abroad wishes to offer its prayers to the victims of this abuse and also its heartfelt apology from its lay membership for the actions of some of its own unaccountable clergy and Hierarchy whom C.A.G acknowledges have in the past objectively and seriously let down and undermined the one true faith over the past number of decades on this and other doctrinal issues.
C.A.G. wishes to remind people that just because some Catholics behave in such an abhorrent manner by their sinful actions in scandalising the young, this in no way changes the fact that the Church established by Jesus Christ, does teach truth, forbids child sexual abuse as a crime that screams to heaven for vengence, but simply just like Judas, some members do not live up to this truth and are ultimately like us all, accountable to Christ for their actions.
C.A.G would also like to point out , whilst every incident of child sexual abuse is wicked, that it is not just in the Catholic Church where this type of abuse occurs, but in many other environments where contact with children can be established. This is very much underplayed by the media. Statistics from the United States indicate that the Catholic Church is no better or worse for this type of crime than many other similar institutions.
NEW ZEALAND
Newstalk
2/12/2005 10:16:05
A retired Catholic teacher's admission that he sexually abused young boys at a school in Feilding has brought shame on the Catholic Church.
John Stevenson has pleaded guilty to seven charges relating to sexual attacks on boys at Hato Paora School in the late 70s and early 80s.
His victims were aged between 14 and 16 at the time.
Father Philip Cody from the Society of Mary says any such offending is wrong and treated very seriously. He says it is sad and shameful that the offending has occurred and illustrates a real breakdown of trust.
NEW ZEALAND
Stuff
02 December 2005
By ANNA WALLIS and NZPA
A catholic order is taking the blame for the sexual abuse of students in its care at the Feilding boarding school it founded.
A spokesman for the Society of Mary (Marist) Phil Cody said members "feel shame, sorrow and sadness" after the conviction yesterday of a former teacher at Hato Paora College for the sexual assault of five boys.
John Louis Stevenson, 66, of Wellington, admitted abusing the boys, aged between 14 and 16, between 1976 and 1981 at Hato Paora where he was known as Brother Bernard.
AUSTRALIA
ABC
A man who sexually abused 20 teenage boys has been sent to jail for six-and-a-half years.
Paul Ronald Goldsmith, 60, committed 42 sex offences 30 years ago.
Goldsmith targeted boys aged between 13 and 16.
He befriended them through his work as an athletics coach at Marist College in Burnie in northern Tasmania, his association with church youth groups and golf clubs, as well as through friendships with their parents.
He took the victims on camping trips and invited them to his home for prayer meetings, frequently plying them with alcohol and giving them cigarettes.
IRELAND
Irish Examiner
By Neans McSweeney, South-East Correspondent
CHURCH assets will be sold if necessary to meet the costs of compensating victims of clerical sex abuse, the Auxiliary Bishop of Ferns Eamonn Walsh has confirmed.
Speaking at a closed financial meeting in the diocese, Bishop Walsh said that 23 settlements have been reached with victims and a number of other cases are outstanding. He again apologised to the victims of clerical sexual abuse.
Despite all the controversy, he said churchgoers in the diocese are digging deeper and parish contributions in Ferns increased by €6,000 last year. But the Church's finances are coming under strain, Bishop Walsh said.
"Regarding settlements and the finances of the diocese, there have been 23 settlements in the diocese and the total cost to date has been €3,826,350," he said.
The diocese is currently involved in litigation proceedings with 13 people, some of which will be resolved through mediation.
ORLANDO (FL)
Sun-Sentinel
Mark I. Pinsky
Sentinel Staff Writer
Posted December 2 2005
A woman and two men who say a priest molested them nearly four decades ago sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orlando on Thursday.
The actions bring to eight the number of suits that have accused the Rev. Vernon Uhran of sexual abuse of young people while he was assigned to St. Mary Magdalen parish in Altamonte Springs.
Thursday's filings, each seeking more than $5 million in damages, charge that Uhran, who was removed from the ministry in 1992, engaged in a variety of abusive acts with the minors. One suit accuses him of molesting a 7-year-old girl while she was sleeping on her living-room floor in 1967.
The Tidings
Third in a series.
Editor's note: In 2002, the California Legislature passed legislation written by personal injury attorneys interested in suing the Catholic Church. The legislation, known as Senate Bill 1779, allowed for the revival of claims of sexual abuse that previously had been barred by a statute of limitations. The result was an avalanche of lawsuits filed against the Church, the majority of which were for claims of abuse stretching back 30 to 70 years.
The media reminds us that there are more than 550 claims pending against the Archdiocese alleging sexual abuse of minors by clergy. What the media does not clarify is that Senate Bill 1779 singled out the Catholic Church as a target for these claims and other claims dating all the way back to the early 1930s.
That any priest, teacher or any other adult would abuse his or her trust by sexually exploiting a child is as heinous to the Catholic Church as it is to the public at large. Cardinal Mahony has expressed his personal sadness regarding past allegations of abuse by clergy, and has instituted many steps to create safe environments for all so that the future will not resemble the past.
The Tidings
By John Thavis
A long-awaited Vatican document drew a sharp line against priestly ordination of homosexuals, but in the process raised a series of delicate questions for church leaders and seminary officials.
The nine-page instruction, prepared by the Congregation for Catholic Education, said the church cannot ordain men who are active homosexuals, who have "deep-seated" homosexual tendencies or who support the "gay culture." Those who have overcome "transitory" homosexual tendencies, however, could be ordained, it said.
The document was officially released by the Vatican Nov. 29 after years of preparation. Its full title was "Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations With Regard to Persons With Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Sacred Orders."
WASHINGTON (DC)
The New York Times
By NEELA BANERJEE
Published: December 2, 2005
WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 - A cover letter attached to a Vatican directive that would bar most gay men from entering seminaries also prohibits priests with "homosexual tendencies" from teaching or running seminaries.
The letter, first reported by Catholic News Service, was dated Nov. 4 and sent to Roman Catholic bishops and signed by Cardinal Zenon Grocholewski, prefect of the Vatican's congregation on education, which devised the directive. A copy of the letter was provided to The New York Times by Origins, a unit of the news service that publishes church documents.
The directive "does not call into question the validity of the ordination" of priests "with homosexual tendencies," the letter noted. But the letter said that "because of the particular responsibility of those charged with the formation of future priests, they are not to be appointed as rectors or educators in seminaries." The letter and the directive do not define "homosexual tendency."
Daily Illini
By John Bambenek
Published: Friday, December 2, 2005
It appears that some pundits believe the only acceptable response to the Catholic sex abuse crisis would be for the Pope to say, "You know, 2000 years has been a good run. We're out. Peace!" Then he would close the doors of the Catholic Church forever. This mentality can be seen by those who think the recent Vatican statement on homosexuals in the priesthood is somehow metaphysically about the sex abuse crisis.
The new rules basically say that active homosexuals or those supportive of gay culture (such as advocating gay marriage) cannot be ordained. In short, priesthood candidates need to live the doctrine of celibacy and be prepared to accept Catholic moral teaching. Current priests who are gay are unaffected, contrary to news reports that couldn't manage to find a quote from anyone in support of the new rules. There may be two sides of every story, but only one side apparently has enough merit to warrant quotes.
Eric Naing seems to think the new rules are about the sex abuse crisis. He also has found people to be homosexuals in almost every column this year based on inane details. It is no wonder Eric is worried about the difficulty of defining homosexual tendencies when he seems to think footwear choice is a matter of sexual orientation.
Pope John Paul II called for a study on the question of whether to admit homosexuals into the priesthood in 1994. The year 1994 is also known for being approximately eight years before the sex abuse crisis.
FRANCE
SBS
2.12.2005. 17:48:31
A court in Paris has overturned the child sex convictions against six people, including a priest, after one of France's most embarrassing judicial fiascos.
The acquittal in the Paris appeals court clears the way for hefty compensation claims by the accused, and comes a day after an unprecedented apology by a leading state prosecutor who told the six their trial had been a "veritable catastrophe".
An official inquiry has been called into how the case was mishandled by Justice Minister Pascal Clement, who apologised over what he described as a "disaster".
HAWAII
KGMB
Lisa Kubota – lkubota@kgmb9.com
An Oahu man who settled a high-profile sex abuse case against a Catholic priest is now accused of raping a teenage girl on Kauai nine years ago. Eugene Saulibio was in a Lihue courtroom Thursday morning, this time as the alleged abuser. Police began their investigation back in April.
"Eugene is deeply distressed. He was a member of this community for a long time," said Saulibio's attorney, Victor Bakke. "People know him, they respect him and it's very unfortunate that he's here today."
Officers arrested the 44-year-old on Oahu for allegedly raping a 14-year-old girl during a two-month period in 1996. Police said she was a family friend on vacation staying at his former home on Kauai. Bakke believes the timing is suspicious, since his client settled a sex abuse case involving Father Joseph Bukoski three weeks ago.
"It just happened to come out about the same time Eugene came into some money with a settlement that we believe the complaining witness is aware of," said Bakke.
NEW JERSEY
The Times
Friday, December 02, 2005
By LINDA STEIN
Staff Writer
A Roman Catholic priest accused of molesting an 11-year-old girl turned himself in yesterday and, after a brief appearance before a Superior Court judge, was released on his own recognizance.
The Rev. James Selvaraj, 46, the adjunct priest of St. Raphael-Holy Angels Parish in Hamilton, is charged with one count of endangering the welfare of a child for an alleged incident Sept. 28 on the church grounds, said Assistant Prosecutor Robin Scheiner, head of the sexual assault and child abuse unit.
Scheiner told Judge Maria Sypek that she had discussed the case with Selvaraj's defense lawyer, Mark Fliedner, and they agreed that Selvaraj would not be required to post bail but must submit to a series of conditions.
Selvaraj must have no contact with the victim or her family; no contact with any children under the age of 18, either supervised or unsupervised; must turn in his passport and remain in the United States and in New Jersey unless a judge allows him to travel.
Southern Voice
By ELIZABETH WEILL-GREENBERG
Friday, December 02, 2005
The long awaited Vatican document banning gay men and those who “support gay culture” from the priesthood was released this week, sparking outrage among some clergy and gay and lesbian rights groups.
For months, snippets of the document have been leaked to the media, generating speculation as to how sweeping the ban would be and whether it would officially have the pope’s support. But the final document was clear in its position on homosexuality.
The statement claims that gay men and lesbians are “objectively disordered” and the church “cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called ‘gay culture.’”
The bishops, Episcopal Conferences and Superior Generals are charged with enforcing this ban. Spiritual directors, who have a sacrosanct relationship with their seminarians, according to theologian Mary Hunt, are ordered to discourage gays from seeking ordination.
ORLANDO (FL)
Orlando Sentinel
Mark I. Pinsky | Sentinel Staff Writer
Posted December 2, 2005
A woman and two men who say a priest molested them nearly four decades ago sued the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orlando on Thursday.
The actions bring to eight the number of suits that have accused the Rev. Vernon Uhran of sexual abuse of young people while he was assigned to St. Mary Magdalen parish in Altamonte Springs.
Thursday's filings, each seeking more than $5 million in damages, charge that Uhran, who was removed from the ministry in 1992, engaged in a variety of abusive acts with the minors. One suit accuses him of molesting a 7-year-old girl while she was sleeping on her living-room floor in 1967.
Another suit, by a former altar boy now living in Houston, charged that Uhran began abusing him when he was a freshman at Bishop Moore High School in 1970. The alleged abuse continued for three years, according to the suit.
The suit alleges that another priest, the Rev. David Page, walked in while Uhran was fondling the teen at the St. Mary Magdalen rectory. "Father Page quickly exited the room and shut the door," the suit says.
HAWAII
Honolulu Star-Bulletin
By Tom Finnegan
tfinnegan@starbulletin.com
LIHUE » Eugene Saulibio, the Aiea man who received a settlement from a Catholic priest who sexually assaulted him, pleaded not guilty to his own rape charges yesterday in Circuit Court.
Saulibio, a 44-year-old father of three, had little to say both in court and afterward, relying on his Honolulu attorney, Victor Bakke, to answer questions from the judge and the throng of media outside the courtroom.
Bakke entered a not-guilty plea for the four first-degree sexual assault charges filed against his client, and received a Feb. 27 trial date.
His lawyer also said that the $80,000 bail Saulibio posted was a hardship on his family and requested a reduction. Judge George Masuoka ordered a bail study.
FORT COLLINS (CO)
TheDenverChannel.com
FORT COLLINS, Colo. -- The lawyer for a former Roman Catholic priest accused of sexual abuse said Thursday that the 43-year-old man denies the charges.
Erik Fischer told The Denver Post that a man in his 20s brought the allegations against his client, the Rev. Timothy Joseph Evans.
Evans was advised Wednesday in Larimer County Court of the felony counts against him, including two counts of sexual abuse on a child by a person in a position of trust, a pattern of abuse and contributing to a delinquency of a minor.
It was not clear if he entered a plea at the hearing -- few details are available about the case because the court file has been sealed and a gag order was issued. Evans is scheduled to appear in court next on Dec. 20.
According to Fischer, the claims against Evans go back to 1998, the first year he served at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton parish, which has more than 2,000 members. Evans was removed from his position as pastor three years ago.
WORCESTER (MA)
Telegram & Gazette
By Kathleen A. Shaw TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
kshaw@telegram.com
WORCESTER— The national Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests and a Maine activist with Voice of the Faithful yesterday questioned why a Maine priest accused of sexually abusing a Southboro man several years ago is still in active ministry in Maine.
Michael Stuart, then of Southboro, filed suit here in U.S. District Court in late 1995 alleging incidents of sexual abuse by the Rev. Real Nadeau. Rev. Nadeau is a pastor in the Portland, Maine, Diocese. The suit was settled in 1996 for an undisclosed amount of money.
In a letter to Bishop Richard Malone of the Portland Diocese, Barbara Blaine of Chicago, president of SNAP; David Clohessy of St. Louis, executive director of SNAP; and Paul Kendrick of Portland, who is with the Voice of the Faithful-Maine Ignatius Group, asked for more information about the Worcester lawsuit, which named the Portland Diocese.
Sue Bernard, communications director for the Portland Diocese, said yesterday the allegations were investigated by the diocese at the time of the suit and no evidence surfaced that would show the events described in the suit actually happened. She said Rev. Nadeau has always denied the allegations. Mr. Stuart was 26 at the time of the alleged incidents and was an adult, she said.
“There are no plans to remove Father Nadeau at this time because there is no reason to do it,” she said.
Ms. Bernard said the lawsuit was settled without admission of guilt but terms were confidential. She said payment of some money was involved.
The lawsuit said Rev. Nadeau was “a sexually active homosexual” who “solicited” Mr. Stuart to engage in homosexual sex for money.
“All we know of this case is what we’ve seen in these court documents,” Ms. Blaine said.
“We haven’t spoken to either the victim or his attorney. But if Father Nadeau hurt Stuart or anyone else, we want them to know they can call us for help,” she said.
The SNAP officials and Mr. Kendrick have asked the bishop to reveal terms of the settlement, divulge the age of Mr. Stuart when he met Rev. Nadeau, and disclose whether other allegations have been made against the priest.
The Maine diocese alleged in its answer to the suit that Mr. Stuart admitted to “a history of dysfunctional sexual behavior.” The diocese said he worked as a stripper and male prostitute “and has had sexual relationships with adults other than Father Nadeau.”
The diocese maintained the lawsuit was part of “a scheme to go from diocese of diocese” seeking money. They said past court actions involved the Worcester diocese, the Hartford diocese and the Manchester, N.H., Diocese.
“We strongly doubt that all of this is true,” Mr. Kendrick said. “Even if part of it is true, that doesn’t mean Nadeau didn’t abuse Stuart. After being terribly betrayed and abused, some victims do end up becoming promiscuous and self-destructive,” he said.
Gay City News
By ANDY HUMM
Cardinal Josef Ratzinger was the author of some of the most vicious, anti-gay documents to come out of the Vatican in the 1980s, labeling even the status of being homosexual “an intrinsic disorder” and suggesting that gay victims of violence bring it upon themselves by claiming civil rights protections for behavior “to which no one has any conceivable right.”
Now, as Pope Benedict XVI, he has made an attack on gay people his first major act, ordering Catholic seminaries to expel men with “deep-seated homosexual tendencies,” even going so far as to encourage their confessors to “dissuade” these men in the sacrament of Penance from “proceeding toward Ordination.”
The document is widely viewed as a response to the priest sex abuse scandals, though it makes no mention of men already ordained. It is being condemned by gay priests and their allies as scapegoating, an insult to their ministry, and unsound psychologically and theologically. Some seminary directors have preemptively rejected the document, others welcome it. At least one American priest has resigned over it.
SYRACUSE (NY)
Hartford Courant
9:22 AM EST, December 1, 2005
Associated Press SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- A pastor accused of raping a teenager in his congregation will return to court Thursday on a new charge that he sexually assaulted a Connecticut teen in 2000.
Jaree Jones, 30, was charged Wednesday with sexual assault and risk of injury to a minor, both felonies, on warrants issued in Waterbury, Conn. He will be arraigned in Syracuse City Court.
Jones, pastor of the Refuge Temple of Syracuse, was charged Nov. 9 with second-degree rape and second-degree criminal sexual act after a 15-year-old Syracuse girl told police he raped her. The girl said Jones assaulted her several times between May 2004 and March 2005 at his home and church, where the girl's family attends services.
Syracuse police Sgt. Tom Connellan said the second victim came forward this week after seeing reports of Jones' arrest on the Internet. The girl had reported the attack to police shortly after it happened and a warrant was issued for Jones' arrest.
FORT COLLINS (CO)
TheDenverChannel.com
FORT COLLINS, Colo. -- A former Roman Catholic priest was advised Wednesday of felony sexual assault charges against him, according to court documents.
Former Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton parish priest Timothy Joseph Evans, 43, faces two counts of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust and one count of contributing to the delinquency of minor, according to court documents.
City police and prosecutors said a gag order kept them from discussing details.
Police requested an arrest warrant for Evans on Nov. 22, when District Court Judge Jolene Blair ordered the case file sealed.
CANADA
Vancouver Westender
By Sean Condon
Dec 01 2005
Payoff to residential school victims lets churches off easy, elder says
Wilfred Price, a 57-year-old Haida elder, knows the sort of damage residential schools can do to a family. Both his father and uncle were snatched away from their village when they were children and taken away to a residential school in Alert Bay, on Vancouver Island. They spent eight years in the school and were completely cut off their family.
"When my father went to school, his father did not know that he had been in school for five years," says Price, who's helping organize a series of protests and sit-ins at churches across Vancouver, starting Dec. 4.
"The principal asked [my father], 'How come [you don't] get gifts?' My father says, 'My dad doesn't know we're alive, and letters that are sent home only reach an Indian agent who throws them away.'"
Run by the Anglican, Catholic and United churches, residential schools operated across Canada for more than a century. The system, sponsored by the federal government, forcibly removed aboriginal children from their communities in order to assimilate them into white culture. The school environment was rife with physical, emotional and sexual abuse.
Price says his father and uncle would later tell him horror stories of seeing large numbers of aboriginal children being buried in unmarked graves. Although the federal government announced last week it would pay $1.9 billion for residential school survivors, Price says the deal lets the churches off the hook. He says he won't be satisfied until the churches admit they killed thousands of aboriginal children and help begin to uncover their remains.
PEORIA (IL)
Journal-Star
Thursday, December 1, 2005
Nine civil lawsuits alleging sexual abuse by five priests and one nun were filed in Peoria County Circuit Court on Wednesday. The suits were filed against the clergy members, parishes they were assigned to during the time of the alleged abuse, and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria.
- The Rev. Edward Bush, accused by Jean Anderson, 54, of sexual assault in 1964 or 1965 when she was 13 or 14 years old and a student at St. Thomas Catholic School in Peoria Heights. Bush was removed from public ministry in 2002.
HAWAII
Honolulu Star-Bulletin
Star-Bulletin Staff
citydesk@starbulletin.com
An Oahu man who received an apology and court settlement from a Catholic priest who molested him 29 years ago pled not guilty today to a charge that he raped a girl nine years ago on Kauai.
Eugene Saulibio, 44, is charged with four counts of first-degree sexual assault.
He made his plea before Kauai Circuit judge George Masuoka.
On Nov. 8 the Rev. Joseph Bukoski III and his order, the Fathers of Sacred Hearts, apologized for Bukoski’s sexual abuse of Saulibio in 1976.
Saulibio’s attorney Victor Bakke said today that the rape charges came as a complete surprise to his client.
ORLANDO (FL)
WFTV
POSTED: 5:32 pm EST December 1, 2005
UPDATED: 6:15 pm EST December 1, 2005
ORLANDO, Fla. -- There are new allegations of sexual abuse and new multi-million dollar lawsuits against the Orlando Diocese. Three more people said the same priest abused them when they were kids.
Father Vernon Uhran, who has now been accused of abuse by eight people, was removed from the priesthood in 1992. But one of the new lawsuits levels a disturbing accusation against another priest, who heads up a parish in the Melbourne area.
A man referred to as John Doe #6 accuses Father David Page, who has run Holy Name of Jesus Church for years, of doing nothing when catching Father Vernon Uhran in the act of sexually abusing him in a church rectory in the early 1970s.
One of the men said Father Uhran repeatedly sexually abused him in the 1970s, when he was a student at Bishop Moore High School in Orlando, where Father Uhran taught a course on "Love, Sex and Marriage."
SAN FRANCISCO (CA)
Marin Independent Journal
Nancy Isles Nation
The Archdiocese of San Francisco is contemplating whether to let a Marin priest at the center of a settled sex abuse case keep his job.
A $4 million lawsuit filed Oct. 6 under the initials of J.T. to provide anonymity for the plaintiff claims that the Rev. John Schwartz sexually abused him in 1986 and 1987 when he was a student at the Jesuit High School in Beaverton, Ore.
Schwartz is on leave from his assignment at St. Anselm's Church on Shady Lane in Ross. St. Anselm's School, an affiliated elementary school, is around the corner on Belle Avenue in San Anselmo.
The settlement with Jesuit High School in Portland and the Oregon Province of the Society of Jesus, a Jesuit organization, awards $95,000 to the plaintiff. Details of the agreement are not publicly available.
SYRACUSE (NY)
News 10 Now
Updated: 12/1/2005 7:23 AM
By: News 10 Now Web Staff
A Syracuse pastor was arrested again yesterday while out on bail for sex charges.
Syracuse Police say Jaree Jones was arrested on an outstanding warrant in Connecticut. It dates back to 2000 for sexual abuse in Waterbury. Jones already faces rape and criminal sexual act charges here in Syracuse.
IRELAND
RTE News
01 December 2005 19:21
The Court of Criminal Appeal has certified that the former nun Nora Wall, who was wrongly convicted of rape, has been the victim of a miscarriage of justice.
Mr Justice Nicholas Kearns said the court was satisfied that newly discovered facts showed that there had been a miscarriage in her case.
Earlier, it was revealed that a young woman was lying when she gave an eyewitness account under oath in 1999 of seeing Ms Wall rape a 10-year-old girl.
VATICAN CITY
The Catholic Telegraph
VATICAN CITY — A long-awaited Vatican document drew a sharp line against priestly ordination of homosexuals, but in the process raised a series of delicate questions for church leaders and seminary officials.
The six-page instruction, prepared by the Congregation for Catholic Education, said the church cannot ordain men who are active homosexuals, who have "deeply rooted" homosexual tendencies or who support the "gay culture." Those who have overcome "transitory" homosexual tendencies, however, could be ordained, it said.
The document, expected to be released at the Vatican in late November, was published online Nov. 22 by an Italian news agency.
Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk, who reviewed a copy of the document, said, "It contains no real surprises. Those who are engaged in homosexual behavior, those who are active in the homosexual sub-culture of our society, and those whose homosexual orientation is so deep seated as to prevent them from relating correctly to others (both men and women) should not be allowed to enter the seminary or be ordained.
Christian Post
Wednesday, Nov. 30, 2005 Posted: 7:38:36PM EST
The Vatican had always made it clear to bar homosexuals from the priesthood. However, the recent Instruction on homosexuality needed to be published, said a Vatican consultant, as the issue posed to be a greater problem of concern.
Msgr. Tony Anatrella, a French Jesuit who is a consultant to the Pontifical Council on the Family, drew attention to the question of accepting homosexual men into priesthood that had been repeatedly raised. Council decisions had always rejected admitting men who were homosexual. A 1961 Vatican document had also affirmed their being barred from the priesthood.
"Homosexuality has become an increasingly worrisome problem," Anatrella wrote in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano. Accepting homosexuality could have a "destabling" effect on the lives of the individuals and on society, he added.
In an I Media interview, Msgr. Anatrella, who labeled homosexuality as a "tendency and not an identity," said homosexual men who become priests create complications even when chaste.
NEW ZEALAND
New Zealand Herald
01.12.05 1.00pm
A convicted paedophile is dividing the tiny Northland community of Panguru on the north side of the Hokianga Harbour.
Former teacher Kaperiere Leef, who is HIV positive, was convicted in 2001 of sexually assaulting boys at Auckland's Hato Petera College.
He has lived in Panguru since his release from prison in 2003.
Although he was welcomed onto Ngati Manawa Marae when he got out of jail, his actions since - including involvement in an ongoing Maori Land Court case - have caused ructions. ...
Mr Leef, who trained as a Marist Brother and priest but was never ordained, taught at Auckland's Hato Petera College from 1996.
COLORADO
The Coloradoan
By SARA REED
SaraReed@coloradoan.com
The sexual abuse scandal that has engulfed the Catholic Church has surfaced in Fort Collins, with a former priest facing charges of sexually assaulting children.
Former Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton parish priest Timothy Joseph Evans, 43, was advised Wednesday afternoon in Larimer County Court that he is charged with two counts of sexual assault on a child by a person in a position of trust and one count of contributing to the delinquency of minor, all felonies, according to court documents.
The Fort Collins police department and the Larimer County District Attorney's Office, citing a gag order placed on the case Wednesday by County Court Judge Peter Schoon, have declined to confirm that Evans is a former priest or discuss where he was arrested or the amount of his bond. A call to the Larimer County Detention Center revealed that Evans was not booked into the jail. District Court Judge Jolene Blair ordered the file sealed on Nov. 22, the day an arrest warrant for Evans was requested by police.
However, a public records search by the Fort Collins Coloradoan showed Evans lived in a residence owned by the church and that an investigation into the allegations began in 2004. Records also indicate that the alleged crimes would have been committed while Evans was serving at the church. However, it is not known if those allegations involve children from the church.
NEW JERSEY
NorthJersey.com
Thursday, December 1, 2005
By MARY ELLEN SCHOONMAKER
WHAT DO Catholics who disagree with the Vatican's new "instruction" on gays and the priesthood do now? The church is not a democracy, so we can't vote the pope out of office.
But we find it harder and harder to defend a church that shows such a cruel face to the outside world.
It's bad enough that the Vatican seems to think keeping gays out of the priesthood will solve the sex abuse scandal. It's worse that the church is reaffirming its bizarre definition of gays as "objectively disordered" and insisting that being a gay priest "gravely obstructs a right way of relating with men and women."
Translated into plain English, what exactly does that mean?
And since when do straight priests have a monopoly on wisdom and compassion?
Some American bishops are criticizing the directive. The bishop in Rochester, N.Y., has written that "the key to a life of celibacy is sexual maturity, not sexual orientation."
YAKIMA (WA)
Yakima Herald-Republic
By JANE GARGAS
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC
A former employee of the Catholic Diocese of Yakima is still waiting for a response to his lawsuit alleging he was wrongfully discharged from his job.
Robert Fontana filed suit in Yakima County Superior Court in August, about a week before he resigned from his position as director of evangelism for the diocese.
Gary Lofland, Fontana's attorney, returned to court Tuesday, arguing that the diocese was ignoring the suit, and requested a January court date.
"We're disheartened that the Catholic church and its spiritual leader, Bishop Carlos Sevilla, won't acknowledge that there is a strong public policy to protect children from sexual abuse," Lofland said in a telephone interview Tuesday.
Noting that the new motions are procedural in nature, Robert Boggs, attorney for the diocese, said Fontana's lawsuit will probably be answered next week.
He declined to comment further, saying he didn't have the authority to speak for the diocese.
Sevilla issued a news release Wednesday, saying the lawsuit, which he believes is without merit and not based on fact, will be defended against vigorously.
Lofland contends that Fontana was forced to leave his job because he was critical of how the diocese was applying its policy on clergy sexual misconduct with vulnerable people.
MichNews
By Barbara Kralis
MichNews.com
Dec 1, 2005
On November 29, as President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops [USCCB], Bishop Skylstad, Bishop of Spokane, WA, released a USCCB Press Statement regarding the Vatican’s promulgation, on the same date, of a document entitled: "Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the discernment of vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders.” After reading the Vatican document, Bishop Skylstad and others have still concluded that it is O.K. to ordain celibate homosexuals to the diaconate and the Priesthood (interview with the Washington Post on November 29, Bishop Skylstad). But is it?
This question must be answered clearly and absolutely by Catholic Bishops for the good of the Church in the United States. There are homosexual ears and heterosexual ears listening. No homosexual is going to enter a seminary if he knows for certain that he will be turned down in the end for ordination. Similarly, heterosexual healthy men will not enter a seminary if they know that people will judge them as being homosexual. It is difficult enough to convince people that a celibate priest is not homosexual when people think that homosexuals cannot be ordained. However, it is far more difficult to convince them if they think that bishops are ordaining celibate homosexuals. The people then think that possibly this priest or seminarian is a homosexual. Moreover, given the sex saturated culture in the United States, this possibly becomes a probably in the mind of these people. The bishops must make it absolutely clear that they do not permit homosexuals to enter the seminary or be ordained to the diaconate or priesthood as a matter of justice to heterosexual priests, seminarians, and deacons!
The Washington Times
By Julia Duin
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
December 1, 2005
A long-awaited Vatican document on homosexual priests, released Tuesday, shows a fault line running through the Catholic Church as to what levels of homosexuality are acceptable.
In some American dioceses, such as Los Angeles and Rochester, N.Y., bishops have indicated they will continue to ordain celibate homosexuals.
"To gay young men who are considering a vocation to priesthood: we try to treat all inquiries fairly," Rochester Bishop Matthew Clark wrote Nov. 12 in the Catholic Courier, his diocesan newspaper. "You will be no exception."
Others dioceses, such as Arlington, say a candidate must "not suffer from a disordered sexual orientation, i.e. not consider oneself to be homosexual."
The Georgetown Voice
The Roman Catholic Church has again made itself more irrelevant to its flock and the contemporary world. This week, the Church released a document reinforcing its ban on ordaining homosexual priests, whether practicing or not, and those who condone homosexuality. The document revealed the Church’s deep-seated ignorance of the nature of homosexuality and its refusal to face the reality of its world. If the Church is to be a force for good in the world, it must confront the facts without willful bigotry.
The Church continues to espouse a theory in the document that most rational people have left behind: that homosexuality is a choice. In reality, homosexual men and women can no more shed their attraction for the same sex than they could change their eye color or height. Adherence to this theory of sexuality shows that the Church hasn’t learned the lessons of Galileo: You can’t fight—or squash—the truth.
Furthermore, the Church’s document is bigoted, reinforcing the idea that homosexuality is some kind of overwhelming trait that prevents a person from leading a productive life (or a priest from being a productive minister). This belief perpetuates the erroneous idea that homosexuals are more likely to be sexual predators than heterosexuals. While the Church may think this is an answer to the child molestation scandals of recent years, a better answer would be more transparency and harsher punishments for guilty priests, not a wild swipe at conscientious seminarians who happen to be gay.
DETROIT (MI)
Detroit Free Press
December 1, 2005
BY SUSAN AGER
FREE PRESS COLUMNIST
Tom O'Brien: gay and celibate
Bravo to Tom O'Brien, a Jesuit priest.
He told Detroit a secret this week. He told us he is gay. He told us he has, however, led a celibate life.
He had guarded his secret for a lifetime, as if he were a murderer whose confession would put him in prison for life.
You wonder how a man like Tom O'Brien could be afraid.
In her front page account Tuesday, Free Press reporter Patricia Montemurri quoted O'Brien saying: "For some people, it won't make a dime of difference to them about me, and for others, they'll never hear a word I say again."
SEATTLE (WA)
Kentucky.com
BY NANCY BARTLEY
The Seattle Times
SEATTLE - When Ireland's High Court weighs whether to allow the extradition of fugitive Fred Russell to stand trial for a 2001 crash that killed three Washington State University students, the decision could hinge on how the court views the U.S. criminal-justice system.
Some past extradition requests have been turned down by Irish authorities because of concerns over how prisoners were treated in the United States, or the length of time a defendant would be held in a U.S. jail before going to trial.
In July, one request was turned down because an Irish judge saw a news photo of Arizona inmates being paraded through town in pink, prison-issue underwear. The shocked judge called the act degrading and humiliating and turned down the extradition request. The defendant was released.
Other extradition attempts have been turned down because what's regarded as a crime in the United States is not considered a crime or an extraditable offense in Ireland - bail-jumping, for example, is not a crime there, said Whitman County, Wash., Chief Deputy Prosecutor Carol LaVerne.
OAKLAND (CA)
Inside Bay Area
By Angela Hill, STAFF WRITER
OAKLAND — If a potential Roman Catholic priest is free from the sins of the flesh, it should not matter if the man is gay or straight, several East Bay Catholics said Wednesday in response to the Vatican's latest policy declaration on gays in the priesthood.
"It's a superfluous comment," said Cecilia McKee, 38, of Berkeley, referring to Tuesday's official statement from the Vatican that the church "cannot admit to the seminary ... those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called 'gay culture.'"
"In my mind, priests are asexual anyway," she said. "You can't be gay, but you also can't be heterosexual. You're not supposed to be having sex. So it doesn't matter which way your desires go. The point is whether or not you act on them."
"It's clearly the church's knee-jerk reaction to the millions of dollars they've had to spend on pedophile priests, and all the years they hid those people and moved them from parish to parish," said Robert Saletta, a devout Catholic who works in Berkeley and attends Mass inSan Francisco.
ARIZONA
Phoeniz New Times
By Robert Nelson
Published: Thursday, February 24, 2005
Monsignor Dale Fushek had long been the rock star of the Catholic Church in the United States.
He founded America's largest program for Catholic teenagers, Life Teen, at his parish in the East Valley in 1985. Today, about 100,000 high-school-age Catholics across the country attend his program each week.
As the flamboyant, charismatic leader of that program, Fushek reigned as the de facto spokesman for the country's Catholic youth. He is credited with bringing America's young Catholics back to the church by energizing, personalizing and modernizing church doctrine. He also is credited with bringing Pope John Paul II and Mother Teresa to the Valley.
During the pope's visits to Tempe in 1987 and to St. Louis in 1999, Fushek organized and led major youth events associated with the trips, essentially serving as the ambassador to John Paul II and the national media for America's next generation of Catholics.
Fushek, not long ago second in command to former bishop Thomas O'Brien, also was arguably the most powerful, popular and financially connected priest in Arizona.
He was so connected, for example, that he both successfully solicited massive donations from Charles Keating and later became close friends with the man credited with dismantling Keating's crooked savings-and-loan empire, local attorney Mike Manning.
But, for two decades, there also have been whispers.
Fellow priests used to joke that Fushek created Life Teen to "get teens."
A mounting number of former Life Teen members and church employees lately are saying that wasn't a joke.
New Times interviewed several former employees, co-workers, fellow priests and students of Fushek's, some in exclusive interviews within days of their giving sworn statements to investigators for the Maricopa County Attorney's Office regarding the monsignor.
NEW YORK (NY)
Zenit
NEW YORK, NOV. 30, 2005 (Zenit.org).- The new Vatican instruction on the priesthood and those with homosexual tendencies was exactly the clarification the Church needed, says one expert in the treatment of same-sex attractions.
Father John Harvey, an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales, is director of Courage International, a support group for men and women with same-sex attractions who wish to live chastely according to Church teachings.
He shared his views of the new document with ZENIT.
Q: What is your impression of the new Vatican document on seminaries and those with homosexual tendencies?
Father Harvey: I think it is very good because it does not try to answer every question -- it tells you from the beginning that it will not. I think it is refreshing. It simply sets down norms for bishops, rectors and people in seminary work.
I think it is wise to put the responsibility on bishops and rectors to understand this issue and to make decisions about individual seminarians. I think this is a good thing instead of answering every question.
MARTHA'S VINEYARD (MA)
Martha's Vineyard Times
December 1, 2005
By Ezra Blair
A week after a member of Saudi Arabia's extended royal family reached a plea deal to serve his jail time at the Dukes County House of Correction, a second off-Island prisoner was sentenced to the Edgartown facility.
On Monday, a Bristol Superior Court judge sentenced Rev. Stephen Fernandes, 55, to eight months at the Island's house of correction. Prosecutors had asked for a three-year sentence.
Mr. Fernandes, a Roman Catholic priest in New Bedford, was arrested last November and pleaded guilty on Sept. 26 to charges of possession and distribution of child pornography and posing a child in a state of nudity.
According to the Associated Press, investigators found more than 500 images of child pornography, including 114 video files, on Mr. Fernandes' computer after he sent his laptop to a computer servicing company. Mr. Fernandes also allegedly pretended that he was a 19-year-old woman in a successful effort to coerce a boy to perform a sex act, which Mr. Fernandes recorded.
Berkshire Eagle
Editorial
Thursday, December 01
The Vatican document issued this week strongly reinforcing the church's ban on homosexual priests will further inflame an issue that has divided Catholics. More practically, the ban, apparently a misguided attempt to address the pedophile problem afflicting the priesthood, is likely to make considerably worse a shortage of priests that is felt throughout the Catholic community, including in the commonwealth.
The well-documented abuse of young boys by Catholic priests in America has cost the church millions of dollars in damages and perhaps even more significantly the trust and support of many Catholics. The scandal was magnified a thousand-fold by the decision of church leaders to protect pedophiles by shuffling them from parish to parish, where they could continue to prey on the young, in some cases for decades. When the Vatican belatedly acknowledged the problem it did nothing to discipline those who protected pedophiles beyond hauling Cardinal Bernard Law of the Boston Archdiocese to Rome before he found himself under indictment.
Rather than address the institutional problem of a relatively few pedophiles whose crimes are repeated under the protection of their superiors, the Vatican decided to equate homosexuality with pedophilia and close the door to the priesthood for all gays. Though the ban does not extend to currently ordained priests, it may cause the principled resignations of gay priests who have long served their parishes well. It also narrows the demographic of potential priests to heterosexual men who pledge to remain celibate, which is a poor way to deal with an alarming shortage of priests.
SALT LAKE CITY (UT)
Daily Herald
Jennifer Dobner THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SALT LAKE CITY -- Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff takes the polygamy issue north to British Columbia when he meets next week with his counterpart there and with women's groups concerned about the status of women living in communities practicing plural marriage.
Shurtleff will meet with Wally Oppal, the attorney general and minister responsible for multiculturalism on Dec. 8 in Vancouver.
Oppal, whose been in his job just five months, said he welcomes Shurtleff's visit, advice and the exchange of ideas.
As in Utah, polygamy in Canada has received spotty attention from political and law enforcement officials over the last 50 years. But Oppal said that climate is changing.
"I get a lot of letters from people wondering why we won't do anything about it," the minister said. "When I took office, I made the statement that I am prepared to prosecute."
Historically, however, police investigations have never netted any willing witnesses to testify against alleged perpetrators, he said. Currently the Royal Canadian Mountain Police is investigating allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse in Bountiful, a British Columbia town founded by members of a polygamous sect, he said.
The Courier-Journal
The Vatican's new policy on homosexual priests has set off intense debate among Roman Catholics, into which we wouldn't presume to intrude our views.
But the very openness of that debate and the terms in which it is being conducted are so striking that they should command the attention of non-Catholics, too.
First, and most obvious, is the frank acknowledgement that gays not only constitute a significant presence among seminarians, priests and even bishops but also have been fulfilling those roles successfully.
Second, the policy continues to allow some -- those who can persuade church authorities that their homosexuality was "only the expression of a transitory problem" -- to enter the priesthood.
Yet, third, by barring others "who present deep-seated homosexual tendencies" even though they are prepared to take the vow of chastity, the policy seems to concede that homosexuality is not simply an immoral choice of behaviors that can be unchosen at will.
And, finally, whatever the logic or illogic of these rules, the distinctions upon which they rest or the attempt to link them to preventing sexual abuse of children, at least some church authorities are discussing them with a degree of candor, complexity and humility that has been notably absent from much of the religious gay-bashing of recent years.
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 12.01.2005
A headline about the new Instruction from the Vatican read, "Vatican bans active gays from priesthood." One might add that it bans active straights from the priesthood, too.
Perhaps the celibacy rule will change. But as long as it applies, those who are in sexual relationships of either sort will not be ordained. That is not new, and indeed it is not news.
In fact, the new Instruction says merely that under some circumstances gays can become priests, and under other circumstances they cannot be ordained. It leaves local officials - bishops and seminary rectors - to decide in individual cases.
The document is a stinging defeat for those Catholic conservatives in Rome and in this country who have been blaming gays for the sexual abuse crisis and wanted to ban them completely from the priesthood.
The issue comes down to whether a homosexual orientation is something people choose or something they cannot change.
NEBRASKA
Lincoln Journal Star
BY BOB REEVES / Lincoln Journal Star
A Vatican statement prohibiting homosexuals in the priesthood will not bring about any changes in the Lincoln Diocese, the rector of St. Gregory the Great Seminary near Seward said.
“We’ve basically been on the same page as the document” which was released Tuesday, said Father John Folda. “We’ve already pretty much been following that policy.”
The document titled “Instruction for Vocational Discernment with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and Holy Orders” says men should not be admitted to seminaries or ordained as priests if they practice homosexuality, have “deeply rooted homosexual tendencies” or “support so-called gay culture.”
Those policies merely restate the long-standing position of the church, Folda said.
He said the seminary, which trains men in their first years of preparation for the priesthood, is careful in selection of students.
“When a man expresses interest in the seminary, we spend a lot of time trying to get to know him personally,” Folda said. “If we see evidence of deep-seated homosexuality, we know that the life of a priest isn’t what he’s called to.”
Northern Star Online
Adam Kotlarczyk
• akotlarczyk@northernstar.info
To be fair, the Catholic Church has a fine line to tread. To see just how fine, you need only to read over the recent statement from the Vatican, where the Congregation for Catholic Education issued an official "Instruction" banning homosexuals from entering the priesthood.
It reads, in part, men "who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called ‘gay culture’" cannot be allowed to enter seminaries.
Let’s start by dispelling the obvious. This isn’t a response - let’s hope - to the clergy sex abuse scandals that ripped through the United States in recent years. Although many would like to see the church do more to address those abuses, this does not.
Child molestation is a deviant sexual behavior. Even among those who, like some elements in the church, consider homosexuality to be an abnormal "problem" akin to pedophilia, it must be acknowledged there is a substantial difference between participating in a monogamous, adult homosexual relationship and molesting children.
PEORIA (IL)
Journal Star
Thursday, December 1, 2005
By MICHAEL MILLER
of the Journal Star
PEORIA - Nine civil lawsuits accusing five priests and one nun of sexual abuse were filed Wednesday, hours after alleged victims demanded more "transparency" by the Catholic Diocese of Peoria.
The lawsuits were filed against the diocese, the clergy members and the parishes where they worked. Some of the alleged incidents, dating as far back as the 1950s, occurred in Peoria and Tazewell counties.
Priests named in the lawsuits were the Revs. Norman Goodman, Walter Breuning, Edward Bush, Toussaint J. Perron and Louis Condon. All of them previously had been removed from public ministry by the diocese, in some cases because of allegations brought by some of those bringing the new lawsuits, diocesan officials said.
Criminal charges have only been brought against Perron, who served three years in prison in the 1990s for sexual assault. It was unclear whether that case involved the man now accusing him.
IOWA
Press-Citizen
By The Associated Press
Seven men who claim they were sexually assaulted by a priest who later became the bishop in Sioux City say they want to settle their cases through mediation rather than the courts.
The seven cases, each naming former Sioux City Bishop Lawrence Soens, were turned over to attorneys for the Davenport Diocese and Soens last week, said Craig Levien, the attorney representing the alleged victims.
They are the latest allegations against Soens, who is already defending himself in state court against lawsuits filed by two other victims. Each accuses Soens of molesting them when they were students as Soens was priest and principal at Regina High School in Iowa City during the mid-1960s.
The seven new cases are similar with the victims claiming they were abused as students at Regina, with each alleging they were summoned to the principal's office by Soens under the pretense of being disciplined for bad behavior, Levien said.
Denver Post
By Cindy Rodriguez
Denver Post Staff Columnist
Once again, the Vatican is fending off accusations that it discriminates against many of the Roman Catholic Church's own members after releasing an instruction last week that essentially bars most gay men from becoming priests.
The Congregation for Catholic Education, which wrote the edict, said: "The Church, while profoundly respecting the persons in question, may not admit to the seminary and Holy Orders those who practice homosexuality, show profoundly deep-rooted homosexual tendencies, or support the so-called gay culture."
The writers never mentioned the clergy sexual-abuse scandals that have rocked the Catholic Church, costing millions in lawsuits and prompting countless followers to leave.
But it must have crossed their minds.
Meanwhile, we're still waiting for instruction for how to keep sexual predators from entering seminaries. The church has not been as open and forthcoming as it should be in handling the thousands of victims who have come forward.
CALIFORNIA
Bay Area Reporter
In contrast with LGBT Catholic and civil rights groups, gay and straight Bay Area theologians and ministers are lending a generous interpretation and calm response to a new Vatican instruction that seeks to ban gays from becoming priests.
Local Catholic clergy said the instruction mostly reiterates what the community already knows about priest criteria, and that some worst case scenarios and panic have resulted from reporters mistranslating the Italian document.
The instruction, approved by Pope Benedict XVI in August and signed by the Catholic Education Congregation Prefect Zenon Grocholewski on November 4, appeared on a Roman progressive Catholic Web site, headlined, "Ethical Cleansing" on Tuesday November 22. It was formally published by the Vatican Tuesday, November 29.
The Vatican said Tuesday that there would be no crackdown on gay priests, according to the Associated Press.
PEORIA (IL)
Chicago Tribune
Published December 1, 2005
Nine new sexual abuse lawsuits have been filed against the Roman Catholic Diocese of Peoria for incidents of abuse that allegedly took place up to five decades ago involving five priests and one Franciscan nun.
In the lawsuits, filed Wednesday in Peoria County Circuit Court, alleged victims accuse diocesan priests Revs. Walter Breuning, Norman Goodman, Edward Bush and Louis Condon of making unwanted sexual advances toward them when they were minors.
Rev. Toussaint J. Perron, a member of the Missionaries of Africa religious order, was also named in a suit, as well as a Franciscan nun, Sister Mary Jane.